Brake problem

[ooby]

Hi all, hopefully someone has some idea of a solution/reason for the problem I'm having

Basically when I first jump on my bike in the morning the front brakes are really soft (by this I mean I don't get any friction until I pull them all the way in). I have to squeeze the brakes a few times and then they firm up. Also if I'm riding for a while without braking then they go a little soft as well.

It doesn't do this in the warm weather - only cold weather. It's about 0 degrees celcius here overnight and about 6-9 degrees when riding in the morning.

I have no idea why it's doing this. The bike has relatively new pads and new brake fluid as well.

Any ideas/suggestions?

[White Noise]

it sounds like you may have some air in the system, personally i would bleed the brakes and see if you can get some of it out. hopefully that'll solve the problem
WN
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[the grim reaper]

Ah, be careful on this one, I had exactly the same problem on one of my Blades, there was little or no brake lever pressure when I got on the bike, a few pumps of the lever saw some pressure return but, if I left it for a few seconds, the pressure went again. Once I was riding it, the brakes were fine, as long as I used them regularly.

What it turned out to be was that one of my brake discs had gone 'out of round' and wasn't sitting on the carrier anymore. Once it had heated up through use, it would expand and sit on the carrier again but, once it cooled down, it slipped off the carrier and then pushed one of the pads away from the disc, hence the lack of pressure at the lever.

If you look through the gap in your caliper at the disc, the distance between the top edge of the disc and the caliper should be equal on both sides, compare the two discs as well and see if one of the gaps has closed up on one side only. You should be able to push the disc and it will 'pop' over to the other side of the carrier.

If it has, it's new disc time, I'm afraid.

Cheers

Grim
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[ooby]

Thanks for the replies

I don't think it's an air problem as I'm not going through the brake fluid.
I'll have to check out the pads then. I'll be annoyed if this is the problem though, they are relatively new, wouldn't have done 5000k's on them