Smoking brakes

[leo]

Well I did a little cruise through our local mountains. I was with two other guys, but they were much more experience than I and they waited for me at each turn off. One particular section was mostly downhill. I would brake before the turn and then accelerate and repeat. Then the last little part was just straight and no downhill. I saw the two guys up ahead waiting for me and I casually got on the brakes and I coasted down that little section.

I get to the bottom and smoke is coming from my brakes. I was like WTF? We pull to the side and let them cool down a bit. They asked me if I was riding the brakes and I said no, but I wonder if I did something wrong to have that happen?  :dunno:  I didn't think I was that hard on the brakes and my hand only reached for the front brakes when I was going to slow down. Up to this point in the cruise I had only used the front brakes. I also did use the occasional engine brake as well to keep my speeds in check as I went down the hill.

Well after the cool down, we take off but for the rest of the time I'm much more hesistant about the brakes and used engine braking much more. I also started using the rears as well.

So was it me or was it the brakes on the bike. Iv'e been told it's a pretty rough downhill I guess. For those that go to the Santa Monica mountains, this was on Latigo Canyon Road (I believe that's the correct name. It ends up dropping you off on Muholland I think)

[Blueknyt]

extended light braking can in some cases cause as much heat as multiple HARD braking.  Keep in mind, Big Rig trucks with brakes designed for stopping with heavy loads for many thousand miles can overheat thier brakes on a down hill run.  granted the more experienced drivers learned how to work around that but it still happens.  as you stated you were not that familiar with the route, perhaps in time, you will make the run alittle faster needing less brake.

[Danimal]

Yeah deffinately try and use engine braking and the rear brake as well.  No biggie, but try to even things out next time to take some of the work load off of just the front brake.

Sounds like a fun ride!

-Danimal

[ratz]

I have damaged my discs trying to bed in a different disc from a different front wheel. I held on the brakes while i accellerated around they heated up really fast, and scorched the disc. They never ( as i can recall) smoked. They got extremely hot too. Maybe it was your prolonged use.

There is a possibility you had some contaminant on your pads. Maybe they had brake fluid on them, maybe some chemical cleaning agent had a chance to slightly soak into your pad. :dunno:

Was it your front pads only?
How old or worn are your pads?
Did it continue after you got to where you were going?

[gsJack]

I too think there must have been some brake fluid or grease involved as I  have turned the front rotor blue twice on the 97 GS with heavy down hill braking in the mountains.  Never saw any smoke.

The GS has rather good brakes for a budget bike but they are not up to aggresive riding in the mountains with the single disc fronts. Repeated acceleration to 60-70 mph (downhill of course on short straights and braking hard again for a 20-25 mph corner does build up much heat when repeated over and over in rapid cycles.

Really need more brakes or at least HH pads for playing in the mountains.

[leo]

It's an 04 and I only have 1500 miles on it. I haven't checked to see if they are in good shape though. The reason I was also thinking it was the discs that were smoking is because as we were letting the bike cool I would touch the disc really quickly to see how hot it felt (i still had on my gloves) a puff of smoke would happen. Or it could be that the leather glove would cause smoke as well.

But then the thing that makes me doubt it was the breaks is that they never turned colors. I know in a car you can heat up the discs to turn orange.

Another reason to doubt is was the brakes was one of the other guys there wasn't so sure if was the brakes or not.

I did check the fluid and it still seems good and no it did not continue either. So it's probably my inexperience or something else happened.

[Roadstergal]

Smoking brakes will give you a bad trip.  Don't try it.

[leo]

Now you tell me.  

[Blueknyt]

could have been road grime in the nitches of the pads (water groove) that could have been smoking, ive had it happen on mine too.  not enough grease in the sealed bearings in the front wheel to sling out, atleast not that i found.


More engine less brake.

[Alphamazing]

Yeah, I bet there was something on the pads, too. Brakes can get really hot, but typically don't smoke. The temperatures they get to aren't high enough to cause them to ignite, as they are designed NOT to do that. Other products, though, have a lower burn temp and therefore can combust at temperatures the brake pads reach.

Try braking sooner before your turn in point so that you can use more engine braking, as well as combining front and rear braking. You'll use less front brake, and ergo putting less stress on it AND less nose dive, when you use the front and rear.

[Eklipse]

Engine brake while going downhill. It eases the load on your brakes and keeps them from overheating. Aside from smoking, if you overheat your brakes they could get mushy and not work. This can be dangerous, as you can imagine.

That's pretty common knowledge for anyone who lives around hills or mountains, at least it used to be. Even in a car you're supposed to engine brake when going down steep inclines of any note (even in an automatic trans... that's one of the reasons why there's still a low gear that allows engine braking in an auto trans).

I'm pretty sure this is even in every auto manual. It's in mine anyway.

[ratz]

don't be misled into thinking that engine breaking is a better alternative to breaking. Engine breaking is hard on your valves. It is easier and cheaper to replace pads.

[Blueknyt]

hard on valves?  ok, ill bite, what extra stresses (Valve float asside which can happen during acceleration too)  are placed on the valvetrain during engine brakeing/ Deceleration that Arnt presant when accelerating?


over reving and causeing valve float can happen really easy down hill, but just as easy to cause by down shifting too many gears from to fast of a speed. as to extended engine braking during down hill runs, vehicles have been doing it for years, over weight and otherwise and its used still to keep the brakes from overheating and failing.   i wouldnt use it as only speed control but just as explained, brake savor.  i think even DMV manual discribes down hill traveling using engine to help control decent speeds and help prevent brake failure/overheating.

[Badger]

I think the key to the downhill-engine-braking debate is that you don't have to worry about replacing brake pads, valves, or anything else for that matter if your brakes lose effectiveness due to overheating and you go off the road out of control at high speed and wreck the bike.  Overheated brakes become absolutely useless pretty quickly.  The decision to use engine braking for safe speed control instead of riding the brakes is orthogonal to the cost of the parts it might wear out.

[The Buddha]

I have damaged my discs trying to bed in a different disc from a different front wheel. I held on the brakes while i accellerated around they heated up really fast, and scorched the disc. They never ( as i can recall) smoked. They got extremely hot too. Maybe it was your prolonged use.

There is a possibility you had some contaminant on your pads. Maybe they had brake fluid on them, maybe some chemical cleaning agent had a chance to slightly soak into your pad. :dunno:

Was it your front pads only?
How old or worn are your pads?
Did it continue after you got to where you were going?

OK if you fit the right disc on to the left ( like on bikes that have 2 discs ... or you slap a B4 front disc on a GS500 ) you could gall and break them ... somehting about the reversal stress direction and what not.
Cool.
Srinath.

[Mountaineer]

You definitely need to use both brakes equally. It sounds like you rode the front brake for a long distance, which is a bad practice. Find a gear to hold your speed downhill, or at least give some resistance, and use the brakes intermittently, like before curves. Using only one brake at the wrong time could cause a skid and down you go.