MG Sports Cars

My 1978 MGB hand brake sat idle too long and now refuses to cooperate. Anybody have experience with alternates (Miata etc.)?

couldn't you just buy a new cable. they are not to bad to change

check to see if #39 and #40 aren't rusted together.

The problem is that the pin at the base of the lever (25) should allow rotation in the ratchet plate (27) but the pin is rusted in place. Tried penetrating oil etc. but stubborn.

I was scrolling thru the hand brakes on EBAY and was surprised to see the hydraulic hand brakes. Because I plan to replace all my brake lines anyway, I might prefer to plumb this in rather than another cable pull. Anybody try one of these? The only downsides I see are the custom fitment between tunnel and my Miata pass seat and the loss of the independent cable system. Neither really seems to be a showstopper.

Commentary?

Consider another name for the hand brake is an "emergency" brake. If your emergency brake uses the same hydraulic system as your main brakes, how do you stop if you lose fluid for some reason?

Gary, there should be a few MG folks out there that have a complete brake lever sitting on the shelf or in a parts car that they would part with. Try a "Wanted to Buy" ad in the Classified Section.

Thanks to Rob for the "Murphy's Law" reminder. I had considered it but then dismissed t because I never had a loss of BFluid experience. Clearly that does not mean I never will. So I took Phil's advice and spent $20 on a used one. Now I can get back to wiring.

I don't think the hydraulic parking/emergency brake is even legal most places.

Anyone know how the new cars with the electric hand brake switch work? Is it not using the fluid as well?

Hydraulic line locks and electronic parking brakes are different. Here's some good info on electronic parking brakes... [www.thecarconnection.com]

But how does it work?

The end of parking brake aided Bootleg Turns.

Quote:

But how does it work?

May have evolved a bit but when I read about them a few years back, they used an actuator that pulled a cable - much like you do manually, just activated electrically.

>The end of parking brake aided Bootleg Turns.

NOoooo... Say it isn't so!

Electric actuator pulling a cable? Yeah, can't see anything ever going wrong with that one... :-P

Jim

Your right Carl, hydraulic parking brakes aren't legal anywhere that I know of.
I had one fail once and it wasn't pretty. It was on a tow truck and it rolled downhill into two police cars and a motorhome that was on fire at the time.
Not much was left and several people were visibly upset!
The push button electric park brake. (actually pull up button, as a push isn't allowed in Canada. Same thing for power windows in later cars.) Generally uses an actuator and cables. For most OEM's the cables are not replaceable, so you buy the whole thing at an eye watering price. We just did one on a BMW that required the dropping of the rear suspension. The final bill was several thousand dollars.
The silver lining though is that the cables rarely fail. The wimpy plastic gearing departs long before the cables ever will. So see, they really have your best interest at heart.
The nice thing I guess, is that they can apply the park brake much harder than you can by hand. So you can still do your bootleg turns Jim.
You just have to calculate the delay and have your foot on the brake so that the body computer (Master of your universe) will authorize the application, as long as you aren't in drive, and going 15kmh or less.
Quite simple really.

Live like you mean it.
Fred