£291 to change brake fluid on Honda CBR600RR with ABS

[B4ndit]

Just done all my bikes as they are three years old now. All the brake fluid was really dark and grotty. Is this the rubber pipes slowly breaking down or water absorption which causes the dark colour.

Anyway its nice to see clear sight glasses on the reservoirs once more.

I don't notice any difference with the brakes. But I try not to use them in anger.

 

[Myke Rocks]

I was thinking of:

I think your guess would be wrong-modern brakes are so good they must generate a lot of heat-where else does all that energy go? In any case look up the boiling point of water and figures for heat generated by disc brakes. You will find that water would boil under fairly gentle braking.

John

The heat disapation charateristics of modern bike's brakes. The pistons are hollow, so they act as an insulator to separate the pad from the caliper, when the pad gets hot. Therefore there is only a very thin ring of metal from the piston in contact with the pad. This will, of course, transmit some heat back into the caliper, and thence the fluid. However, all motorcycles use aluminium calipers which have very good thermal characteristics in their own right, and they are then sitting well out in the airstream, very exposed. Very little of the energy is disapated back into the caliper. Most is shed directly into the air from both disk & pads.
Yes, some people, - mostly ex- motorcrossers - like myself, do tend to make excessive use of the rear brake, and the extreme ones can boil the fluid.
I have been trying to wean myself off excessive rear brake useage over the last few years, and, in recent years appear to be having some success in this respect.
This is, however, stupidity on our part, and no amount of new DOT 4 fluid will prevent such (temporary) brake failures.
Tell persons such as myself who overuse the rear brake to stop using their rear brake so much, and if it happens, pump the pedal quickly to get it back. (albeit temporarily)
Myke

 

[The Grey One]

The heat disapation charateristics of modern bike's brakes. The pistons are hollow, so they act as an insulator to separate the pad from the caliper, when the pad gets hot. Therefore there is only a very thin ring of metal from the piston in contact with the pad. This will, of course, transmit some heat back into the caliper, and thence the fluid. However, all motorcycles use aluminium calipers which have very good thermal characteristics in their own right, and they are then sitting well out in the airstream, very exposed. Very little of the energy is disapated back into the caliper. Most is shed directly into the air from both disk & pads.
Yes, some people, - mostly ex- motorcrossers - like myself, do tend to make excessive use of the rear brake, and the extreme ones can boil the fluid.
I have been trying to wean myself off excessive rear brake useage over the last few years, and, in recent years appear to be having some success in this respect.
This is, however, stupidity on our part, and no amount of new DOT 4 fluid will prevent such (temporary) brake failures.
Tell persons such as myself who overuse the rear brake to stop using their rear brake so much, and if it happens, pump the pedal quickly to get it back. (albeit temporarily)
Myke

I'm confused now! So not much heat is transfered according to the first part of your message but then enough heat in the rear brake can cause new fluid to boil?? When I last looked rear bike rear brakes were much smaller and capable of much less total braking than the front. Are you saying that manufactures make bikes with brakes that are not up to the job? (well OK I know about Harleys!) My experience is that very few riders these days make enough use of their rear brake and several of those who experience rear brake fade admitted that they had changed the front brake fluid but had not bothered with the rear!

What happens is they ride fully laden over a few high passes-need the rear brake to control the bike and then experience brake fade.

Excessive use of the brakes can cause too much heat which causes fade. If the lever/pedal has no resistence then that is the fluid boiling, if the lever/pedal remains firm then it's a problem with the pads/discs. It ain't rocket science,put simply you can't compress a fluid so if you apply a presure at one end of the system(lever/pedal) you will get that pressure at the other end (caliper). If the fluid boils you then have a gas which you can compress, hence no resistence in the system.

We see (and smell) the results of too much braking in cars coming down the mountain road behind our hotel a few times each summer. The drivers, often Dutch and hence not used to real hills, sit white faced on our car park waiting for things to return to normal.

It remains a fact that new fluid boils at a higher temp. than old fluid. I know what I prefer to have in my bike.

John

 

[Boxerboy55]

I have zero experience with your bike (I'd have my knees around me ears if I even managed to sit on it ) but I suspect you'll probably find that the ABS system just adds a few more connections that you need to bleed in a common sense, logical order.

I watched Steptoe do mine (1150GSA with evo servo/abs) and it was just that......a common sense, step by step progression working the system through....nothing fancy, just a bit more complicated with a few more steps in it than bleeding a 'normal' brake system.
.........

Ditto! I watched a local independent change out my servo'd ABS'd GS12 brake system and it was far more complicated, but straightforward none the less. I could not have done it myself - without the custom screw in reservoirs, etc.

He had not done a GS12 before, but once we stripped all the panels off, he got stuck right in.

But it was simply a case of flushing and bleeding the primary and secondary circuits separately. So 4 circuits, not 2. To state the bleedin' obvious, the hand lever and master cylinder doesn't go anywhere near the front wheel.

So, more complicated, but not a "shaft me gently job".

 

[dave hendy]

4.5 hours for brakes
i will ring my mate who works for honda uk
will update tomorrow chaps
somethings not right

Did you manage to speak to your mate? Info from Honda or a Honda dealer would be good

Cheers

Dave