Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Classic Morgans (pre-CX) 4/4 Handbrake performance

I have owned my 1985 4/4 Roadster for two years having previously owned a 4/4 4 seater for ten years so I am aware that the ‘fly off’ hand brake arrangement can be quite ineffective. Has anyone found a way of making it more effective? The brakes have recently been overhauled, new shoes on the rear drums fitted and an extra spring fitted to the centre pivot arm to assist in tensioning the handbrake lever.

New shoes may take a take while to bed in. Slight chamfer on shoe leading edge closest to slave piston aids although ironicallly this is to reduce initial grab.

When you type "more effective" do you wish to make the fly off operation more effective or the ability of the handbrake to hold the Mog on a hill etc...?

I am NO expert and have only ever adjusted one Morgan handbrake, that being on my mid 80`s +8. Thus on the assumption our handbrake systems may be similar..? :-

The handbrake cable adjustment, the quadrant and connecting rods connected that act on the lever system on the brake backplates, should all have free play in them to the extent they have no effect on the adjustment procedure of the rear brakes which should be carried out as the primary step in rear brake adjustment.

Once the rear brakes have been proven to operate in a balanced way via the footbrake, and the handbrake mechanism proven to operate the cable inner freely, should the handbrake cable then seek to be adjusted to act upon the quadrant and thus the levers on the backplates, to then lock up the drums to provide adequate handbrake operation..

I`m guessing that the quadrant has a grease nipple and that it is free to swing on it`s spindle, and that the rod ends are also clean free and greased to protect them against seizing, thus the fly off aspect has been fully operational..?

I have found that paying particular attention to adjusting the cable in order for the ratchet to click fully home while the lever is in a position where you wish it to be with the rear brakes locked on can be worth while. In order to achieve that, perhaps best to have the lever in that position and then adjust the cable to lock up the brakes, ensuring that the brakes are fully released when the handbrake lever is released.

The complexity in handbrake cable adjustment would seem to be related to the fly-off operation whereas on old type handbrakes one just counted the number of clicks heard as the pawl clicked over the ratchet until the brake locked the rear wheels.

More than happy to be corrected if my thinking might be found to have flaws.

Thanks Richard, I’ll consider doing this.

Thanks for your reply. ‘Hold on a hill’ is the issue. I haven’t yet gone through a thorough check of the complete mechanism and adjustment as you describe but will now do so. Thank you for your helpful suggestions.

You need to adjust your rear brake shoe clearance so they are as close as possible to the drums without rubbing, then you need to take as much slack out of the cable run as possible, but you also ideally need to adjust the transfer arms so that the bell crank is applying maximum leverage to the shoes when the handbrake is in the engaged position.

On my 1986 car the transverse rods are pretty much non-adjustable but I found I could get the necessary efficiency to pass an MOT by taking all the slack out of the main cable. It's still not brilliant on really steep hill starts though, sometimes I have to resort to heaving on the handle to provide a bit of extra braking force while I go from brake pedal to throttle to pull away.

also make sure the compression spring is fitted at the end of the cable where it connects to the compensator on the axle, apparently this improves handbrake performance by 30%

David Byrne