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Maturerider

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
Just replaced the rear brake pads on my R1250GS. Last thing I did was pump the rear brake pedal to take up the pressure. On the centre stand I spun the back wheel by hand and when pressing the brake pedal the wheel stopped spinning instantly.

Then I thought, as the brakes are linked, by doing the same thing but this time operating the front brake lever the wheel would stop spinning. No it didn’t! I could keep spinning the wheel.

Do the linked brakes only operate at speed. Is there something I did or are the linked brakes faulty?
 
I did fire it up and ran it in 3rd gear on the centre stand. No joy. Rear wheel didn’t slow down when operating the front brake.
There must be some sort of weight/resistance sensor in the ABS system. I just tried it on my 1250GSA and the front brake lever did stop the rear wheel, but only after I squeezed pretty hard and held it on for about 3 seconds.

Try that.
 
Discussion starter · #5 ·
Will be taking out GS tomorrow. Will see if the braking is any different than in the past. I guess if the linked brakes no longer work it will be not be the end of the world.

Thanks enzo5000 for your help on this issue.
 
Discussion starter · #6 ·
Went out the bike today. No idea if the linked brakes were working but the brakes were just as good as I have always known them to be. I for one love the Hayes front brakes. Far superior to the ‘Bamby‘ brakes on my previous GSs.
 
The brakes are partially integrated so that both front and back brakes are applied when using the hand lever. Remember, however, that the front brake is the primary so that you will have to pull it more to get the rear brake to engage when on the stand. You should be OK if you're feeling normal activation when on the road.
 
My previous R1200GS was in for it's annual MOT test and when finished I asked the examiner if I could try the bike on their brake tester again. The rear wheel was in the rollers and just by operating the front brake lever (engine running) I was able to lock out the rear brake. I only asked because I had fitted 3 sets of rear pads to that bike and no fronts. I use the front brake lever all the time except when slow maneuvering or just before coming to a halt. The front brakes worked normally and it would stop on a sixpence (English small coin) I was just curious why it got through so many rear brake pads.

My current bike a R1250GS has the same braking performance and looking at the pad wear the rear pads are half worn but the fronts still look like new so I think this will wear out the rears like my other bike did. I do not think there is anything wrong with either of them just the way the BMW system works.
 
It's no consolation, I realise, but my R1200GS gets through it's rear pads in about 7k miles while the fronts still had meat on them when I swapped them out at about 20k miles. The BMW mechanic suggested that I might have been using the foot brake unnecessarily because the front lever already activated the rear. I think the wear rate is a 'characteristic' rather than a 'fault'.
 
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