glazed brake pads?

[mottyl]

My front brakes suck. After much bleeding and cursing i disabled the antidive and now have better response from the lever but still not that good. There appears to be lots of pad left but they do not feel like they grab the disc that well.

Can older pads glaze or get heat damaged that would prevent them from biting into the disc? If I removed them and took a wire brush to the pads would that help?

C

ps. After disabling the antidive I was able to get almost all of the air out of the system but now the front end dives for the ground like a seagull after a macdonalds frenchfry whenever you hit the brakes.

oh yea, 1983 750 kat

[RJ]

If your pads were glazed I would think that you would hear a lot of squeaking when you hit the brakes. You didn't mention what brand of brake pads you have but you may want to try to change to EBC or other high quality pad. They really make a difference in the way the pads bite on the rotor. As for the diving, you will need to either up the preload by using the adjuster or putting in a spacer on top of the springs, or get a set of Progressive Suspension springs. Some on this website have advocated using heavier fork oil as well.

[catbed]

i took my brake pads out and sanded them and the discs. one set of brake pads was oily...hmmm. didnt expect much of an improvement but, WOW! i just went up the driveway at like 15 mph, hit the front brake, and skidded the old tire! much improved from before i sanded them.

my forks also used to bottom out under semi-hard braking. i changed the old oil to 15w fork oil and checked air pressure and no more front end diving!

[mottyl]

thanks for the ideas

I'll try a little sanding and if that doesn't work I guess new brake pads are on the shopping list.