Hand Brake Effectiveness for MOT

thescouselander

The hand brake on my car has never been brilliant and the MOT is due in a few weeks so I thought I'd better sort it out. I adjusted the hand brake at the weekend and although there has been some improvement it sitll wont hold on a steep hill.

Can anyone tell me what the required hand brake effectiveness is to pass the MOT?

roddydogs

i had this problem with a Fiat Punto, even thou the brake linings were only part worn, they didnt hold very well, but still passed theMOT.
New linings did the trick-dont use Fiat linings!

oldagetraveller

Check this, it might be useful? http://www.motuk.co.uk/manual_3100.htm

anewman

You need to adjust the rear shoes, rather than tighten up the cable which is only meant to take up cable slack from the cable stretching. Most auto shoe adjust mechanisms do not work.

thescouselander

oldagetraveller wrote: »

Check this, it might be useful? http://www.motuk.co.uk/manual_3100.htm

Great, thanks. So, if I understand correctly, if my car can hold on a slope of 1 in 6.25 (which is about 9 degrees) then I should be ok.

anewman - I adjusted everything including the adjuster on the shoes.

steveo3002

id suggest you have another go...it should easily hold on a steep hill if its set up properly and not worn out

goldspanners

did you deglaze the shoes and clean up the drums?
if so sometimes the effectivness of the brake is poor until brake dust builds up again.

thescouselander

There is probably a bit more detail needed here. The car is a BMW 3 series, the hand brake has dedicated shoes that are only for the hand brake and are not used for normal braking. I took off one of the disks to reveal the brake shoes and they looked in good condition with no noticeable wear, dust or anything like that. The braking surface inside the disk looked ok too.

According to others on one of the owners forums I use the hand brake on these cars are notoriously rubbish. I have considered getting new shoes but apparently this often doesn't improve matters.

I reckon I should pass the test if it only has to hold on a 10 degree slope.

steveo3002

what about the ajusting mech? is it still working ?

might be siezed up

thescouselander

steveo3002 wrote: »

what about the ajusting mech? is it still working ?

might be siezed up

Yeah, seems ok, I could see it moving when I wound it round.

Conor_3

Is the pivot that the hand brake cable attaches to working OK? They're a good one for seizing on most cars.