Front brake pad removal

Front brakes are shot.  Knew that going into the build.  It was the main reason I didn't want to risk riding it home.  Turns out, all of the really cheap CB550 calipers, that I glanced at on ebay before my purchase, are actually for the 80's model, the CB550SC.  Well enough, I believe that the fronts are interchangeable with the 500 twin and four, 400 four and 360 twin.  If it goes bad, I will be scavenging classifieds and attending swap meets.  


So, rebuild it is!


Removing the caliper is easy enough..  I may regret this later, but I drained the system, pulled everything off from the banjo, mounted to the fork mounted fitting, down.  So, that's a rubber line, the metal brake line, and the caliper.  I will probably end up rebuilding the master cylinder as well.


Removing the pads..... harder than it appears with such a simple piece of machinery.


Stationary side:  
 - First, removed a tiny pin running straight through the pad
 - Next, soaked the whole piece in brake fluid over night
 - There is small indentation at the bottom of the housing where you can fit the head of a small flat head or chisel into.  I attempted to show it in this pic, but everything is shown after having already removed the pad.

Indentation in housing marked above

another shot

Give it a couple of knocks with a mallet, wedging the tool in there, and it should come right out.

onto the side that moves.

Dirty, corroded son of a bitch

First, if your master cylinder is working, it is better to remove this pad while everything is still connected on the bike.  Get a bucket, drop the one side of the caliper inside, pump your brake lever, using the brake systems hydraulic pressure to slowly push the pad and piston out and voila, I'm told that it works.


If it's already off the bike... the method that most recommend (due to safety and simplicity) for removing a stuck piston and pad, is the grease gun method.  This sounded simple enough, but getting the pieces together and having the right tool was key.   Basically you thread in a grease fitting or the grease gun hose into the hole where the metal brake line screws into the caliper, pump away, and watch the pad and piston slowly ease out.


I chose the fitting because it seemed to be a cleaner solution, not threading a 1/8" NPT into a metric hole.  However, a 10 mm zerk fitting isn't the exact pitch either, so either way you don't want to screw the fitting or the hose in too far. 

fitting threaded in almost one turn

And so with everything fitted, making sure the bleed valve was completely closed, I pumped away.... As you can see I've got grease coming out at the base of the fitting.....

mini-POS

and... out of the crappy little gun that I was using.  Tightened everything down... and no change in the results.


Other people on the forums said that they had used their mini grease guns before.. and that was all that I had, given that I don't have much to grease around the condo.  So after some solid bouts of indecisiveness, and half a tube of leaked grease, I said fuck it, I'm buying the big one.

Giant lever action and a tube sized to lube up six tractors. 

Snapped the gun attachment onto the fitting, no leaks, a couple of cranks later, the pad slowly emerges... Next comes the piston, and a chamber of grease.  It's not messy at all, but now you have to make sure that you clean all of that grease out from the bore.

And above is the initial result.  Plenty of cleaning left to do.


Not without casualty, managed to get the nipple stuck on the damn grease gun end.  Tried vise gripping the end to loosen the inner jaws, but all I got was stripped metal on the outer barrel..

oh well at least the pads are out.