Playing with the stoppers

After first giving the DL a much needed bath (poor old water blaster had to work hard) I decided that it was time to change the front pads on her.  I'd had the new pads for a while but last time I had checked they still had plenty of wear left on them, so the pads had just sat around gathering dust.

The front brakes have always been a bit of a let down for me (kinda used to those awesome anchors on the Connie).  They are fine off road - not keen on grabbing a handful of brakes and ending up sliding down a hill on my face - but on road I'd like more stopping power.  I guess it's always going to be a compromise, particularly when there's no ABS to help stop those face-sliding moments.  (Conversely the rear brakes are fantastic and superior to those on the Connie).

Anyway, with the Stromtrooper forum open on the appropriate page I got stuck into it.  First up off came the caliper and then out with the old pads and then a little bit of a clean with an old toothbrush.

Those two itty-bitty pistons and two on the LHS caliper are what I'm relying on to halt progress

Then the little metal shim on the back of the old pad needs to be removed, given a clean-up and clipped onto the new pad.  Then the pad can be fitted back into the caliper.

Then repeat for the other pad and slip the caliper back over the disc and bolt it all back together.  Then it's over to the other caliper on the left disc.  Note: I've simplified things a bit, check out that link above if you're going to tackle the job.

Once everything was back together I went for a quick squirt up the street just to make sure things were working correctly.  All good!  No fantastic increase in stopping power but at least I hadn't really stuffed things up and then stuffed the bike into something solid...