Brake problems

[rsperko]

I have an 02 R1150R without ABS. I have had the bike for just over a month and this is my first bike with disc brakes. I found that when pushing the bike around the garage, if I pulled in the front brake lever twice in a row, the brakes took a few seconds to disengage. The second pull was quite a bit harder than the first too. Not sure if this is normal.

Today when riding home in traffic, I engaged the brakes and they did not release all the way, I pulled again and they felt strange. I struggled and pushed it to the side of the road and waited until they disengaged, which took much, much longer than I had noticed before. I rode the bike home using the rear brake only.

At home I engaged the brake once and the brake did not disengage for a long time again. I read this great thread: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=20313&p=178894 and decided that perhaps my master cylinder bleedback was blocked, so I took the cover off. Then being a goof, I pulled the brake lever, fortunately the fluid shot right past me and missed me. I put the cover back on, pulled the lever again and heard a squirt sound. Fluid is shooting out of the hose. It is the second hose from the top (this is the hose that goes down to where it splits to go to both calipers, the long one).

So I have a few questions, is it reasonable that an 8 year old hose could have been the cause of all of my problems even though it did not leak any fluid until I replaced the master cylinder cover? Is it reasonable to only replace this hose, or should I replace them all? Could another issue in the system have created so much pressure as to blow out the hose with my mild mannered grip?

I am willing to disassemble the calipers if I need to, or even rebuild the master cylinder, but my first inclination is to try the simplest possible solution and drain the system and replace the hose and see if that fixes everything. Does that make sense?

Thanks for any help,
-Rick

[boxermania]

You might be faced with two problems, the first one has the appearance of the front pistons not receding into the caliper, possibly due to dirt around the dust seal, the second being the leakage on the hose from the master cylinder to the T split.

First you will have to replace the leaking hose and bleed the system before proceeding with any further evaluation. You might contact beemerboneyard.com for a replacement. If after replacement and bleeding the problem is gone I would venture to say that you had some internal delamination of the inner brake hose that restricted the return of the piston(s) into the calipers.

Like you mentioned, the bike is 8 years old and deterioration, dirt or a combination of the two might be affecting the brake operation.

Last but not least, plan on changing the brake fluid if it hasn't been changed in the last two years.

Good luck and let us know how you made out.

[sweatmark]

... or maybe you've got one or more sticking pistons in those calipers. (whoops! boxermania beat me to the answer)

CycleRob and someone else I think has documented the caliper cleaning/rebuild. Search for the info.

'63 VW Beetle Ragtop
'66 Chris-Craft Cavalier Cutlass

Now that is some sweet old school classic stuff.