Car Rolls Slightly Before Handbrake/Emergency Brake Catches
 

Hi everyone,

After pulling my handbrake up and on a slight incline, my car will roll a little before the handbrake grabs. Every car ive been in has never done this. Is it a normal twin thing? Is there any way to fix/stop this?

Thanks!

Mason

I reckon that would depend upon what you mean by a "little". If an inch or two, I wouldn't worry about it.

Sometimes cars will "shift" a bit on the suspension, when parked on a hill, after the emergency brake is set ....... maybe that's what you are feeling .... ??


humfrz

it rolls about an inch. Ill release my foot off the brake pedal after pulling the handbrake up, it then rolls slightly, waiting for the handbrake to catch. Does yours do that humfrz?

When I set the handbrake on my car, when it's in my sloped driveway, then take my foot off the brake, it "feels" like it moves forward a bit.

However, in reality, the handbrake on our cars is a independent, mechanical system, of levers, cables and brake shoes and drums.

So, if it's working properly, when the handbrake is set, the wheel should be locked in place.

I suggest you have someone observe the wheel, when you set the handbrake and see if it actually does rotate.

Betcha it doesn't ........ it just feels like it does ...... ;)

Report the results of your experiment.


humfrz

When you have your foot on the brake, all four wheels are locked. The handbrake only locks your rear wheels. Releasing the brake pedal, especially on a hill, will allow your front wheels to move a miniscule amount down the incline (backwards when facing uphill, forwards when facing downhill) while the back wheels remain motionless. Your suspension allows this as the car finds a new balance with only the back wheels locked by the handbrake.

HOWEVER.. that to me has always just felt like a settling or re-leveling of the car, and not an actual rolling movement. In an automatic car that's been put in park but not had the handbrake engaged, it's normal for a short roll to take place upon release of the brake pedal, but cars really shouldn't roll, meaning the back wheels rotate, with the handbrake engaged.

Do you have any more travel available on your handbrake? If you pull it up harder, say an other click or two, can you get the car to remain stationary when releasing the brake pedal? If so, then your parking brakes need adjustment or new shoes, or you just need to man up and pull on the handbrake harder! ;) . The adjustment can be done fairly easily. New shoes requires removing the rear calipers and rotors and messing around with fiddly springs which I hate to do. I drove for years w/out a parking brake on my last car just 'cause I hate replacing them so much. It's not that bad, really.. just frustrating if you haven't changed a lot of them.

If you count on your parking brake, then I'd definitely check into your symptoms further. A definite roll, i.e., all four wheels obviously rotating, should not be happening.

Hope that helps..

Barry

It's relatively easy to adjust your hand brake at the handle and the adjusters individually on either wheel but an inch or two of movement before the hand brake fully engages is normal.

One thing I've wondered about this, does it put any pressure on the transmission if you have it in 1st gear and it rolls back an inch?

Well, it really depend if the parking break was engaged or not, and how tightly it was engaged, on what hill.

The answer is yes. But really, the pressure applied to the transmission is insignificant.... It's a very small fraction of the force applied through the gears while accelerating.

Yes, mine does the same thing but only when pointed down hill. Pointing up hill, the brake holds as soon as I pull up the handle. I think it has something to do with the emergency brake's drum-inside-disc design.


There is thread here about a loud "CLUNK" when you pull up the brake handle while moving forward (to slow down without showing brake lights). From that, I surmise that the emergency brake shoes are designed, for some reason, to shift when the car moves forward when the parking brake is applied.

It can put some pressure on a gear in the transmission.

What I suggest is that when you stop, set the emergency first, let off the regular brakes, turn off the engine, then put the car in gear.


humfrz

Hi all,

Sorry to hijack the thread somewhat but I have a similar issue. I know that the wheel is moving when the handbrake is applied. This is only happening on the right hand side and there is no movement in the left hand side wheel.

This is demonstrated here:

https://vimeo.com/150467682

Has anyone encountered this or do you have any ideas of a cause? I have yet to take the hub assembly apart for a closer look.

Jordan

clutch grabs. Brake takes bit to grab as well.

Inclines suck, I try not to park on them. Its hard to get into R if you are on an incline and have to back out. This car is and my last car was, and yes if you don't get that last little click it will roll

I noticed this exact same thing on my car when it was jacked up the other day. Only on the one side though.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk

My car definitely does this, and has since new. It rolls a good inch or two, and I mean actually _rolls_. It is not related to suspension.

I've always just chalked it up to the design of the parking brake. It's also extremely grabby compared to other vehicles I've driven.

Since your wheel is off the ground, that looks to be because of a bit of "play" in the differential ...... :)

Which is OK.


humfrz

This issue is normal operation, it has to do with the design of the parking brake on most Subaru's. The Parking/E-Brake on most Subaru's are a "Drum In Disc" type design where there is a smaller drum brake inside the hub of your rear Disc brakes.

If you have ever worked on "Self-Adjusting Drum Brakes" then you know that the entire Mechanism inside the brakes floats around a bit as a function of the self adjustment part of the brakes. This is what causes the movement when you let off the floor pedal, because you are switching from the disc brake portion of the brakes to the drum brake portion and the drum brake portion of the brakes floats a little bit inside the drum as part of the self-adjustment function of the drum brakes.

Here is a useful animation on how drum brake adjusters work.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/auto-p...rum-brake2.htm

Thanks for the replies very helpful, I had to replace a few bits on that side and never noticed the movement until after I had done so.

I also had a squeak at the time of posting when driving which I thought was related to this but I have since got rid of that and can see it is normal and handbrake functions just fine.

Jordan