gingerprince
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| posted on 27/3/06 at 08:56 AM |
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Setting correct brake bias
Guys
What's the best method for setting up a correct brake bias for the current conditions? My Indy has an adjustable bias valve (the kind that
limits pressure to the rear, not a balance bar thingy).
Anyhow what I want to do is know how many turns is a good "average" setup for my car in wet, in dry, for MOT (if that differs?) and
eventually slicks which I guess may be different again.
So in each of the conditions what's the best method to find the optimum? I'm guessing to wind the valve fully open (so rear gets max
possible) then keep doing brake tests until the rears just stop locking? Or is it better the opposite way? And should I be stomping on the brakes or
being more progressive to allow weight transfer before lockup?
Any tips welcome.
And on the subject of MOT, assuming I don't know the correct bias for an MOT will a "nice" MOT man adjust my bias until the readings
are correct?
Ta,
Sy
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bimbleuk
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| posted on 27/3/06 at 10:41 AM |
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First thing is you want to avoid locking your rear wheels first!
To set my bias brakes I set max front braking and wound in more rear braking till the front wheels stopped locking too early. So I was just on the
verge of locking the rears first if I did an emergency style brake test. I then went a couple of turns back to the front.
At the MOT station I just explained the brakes would need adjusting before the proper test. As it was I was pretty much spot on from my "seat of
the pants" testing 
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britishtrident
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| posted on 27/3/06 at 03:59 PM |
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First of all the fronts must lock first under all conditions --- even schumy set his car up this way.
To do this you set up the car on a DRY good surface, start with too much front brakes and work toward the rear only one turn at a time.
The road test procedure is to start testing at around 10 mph but you can increase this as soon as you are confident the rears aren't going to
lock up instantly -- even so no more than 30. Once you think you are pretty close to the ideal setting try stlight higher speed turning the wheel
slightly as you brake -- but be preapared to take your foot off the brake and apply opposite lock if required.
Once you get all 4 wheels locking at the same instant give the balance bar one full turn towards the front this is the ideal setting for max
deceleration but is tricky to drive so even for racing give it at least one half turn back towards the front.
Wet race setting would be around one full turn towards the rear from the dry setting --- in the wet the back brakes do a larger % of the work.
Normal road setting is one full turn toward the front from the dry race setting.
For SVA 2 or 3 turns towards the from the dry race setting.
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