Handbrake Travel

[Carlos-fandango]

Good morning, can anyone tell me what may be wrong with my handbrake?

It works fine, not ever had it fail (I have not tried to pull away with it engaged) the only thing is that 50% of the time the lever pulls almost all the way up. the other times it pulls maybe 4-6 clicks and sits at the usual height.

In both cases the car does not roll or move. when the lever pulls right to the top it feels as though there is no resistance, it is quite a shock if your not expecting it (nearly knocked my passenger out lol)

Any ideas?

[jeebowhite]

I suspect that the temperature is contracting the cable so you get different lengths. You need to get the handbrake tightened so that you can pull it up within about 4 clicks. I had a garage do it on my Cee'd. charged me £20, and had it so that it was off, 1 click was held well, 2 clicks was held very well and 3 clicks - the car would have derailed the train if it hit me lol.

[JW1982]

Ford uses a different procedure to adjust the parking brake on cars with disc brakes.

To adjust the parking brake you have to insert 0.7 mm feeler gauges between the parking brake lever of the brake caliper and the notch on the caliper body. After the feeler gauges are inserted on both brake calipers the adjustment nut of the parking brake (behind the parking brake boot) must be tigthened until (one of) the feeler gauges come loose. This should be the correct adjustment of the parking brake.

I used this procedure to adjust the parking brake after I converted my rear drum brakes to the Original disc brakes.