With the swift evolution of automotive technology, the need to maintain your motorcycle has lessened considerably over time.
While this may be especially true for premium machines like a Harley Softail, ignoring regular maintenance can lead to a damaged motorcycle, and in the case of brakes, serious handling risks that can put your life in danger.
This is why it’s always a great idea to learn how to get your Softail’s brake pads changed.
Replacing your brake pads isn’t very difficult, but it can be time-consuming. You should dedicate an afternoon to changing them.
If you’re not familiar with the entire process of cleaning and replacing your brake pads, read this article where we tell you how to change your brake pads and why you should.
Table of Contents
Tools You’ll Need to Change Your Brake Pads
There are some basic tools you’ll need to carry out this task. Ensure that you have:
- Spanners, Allen keys, or sockets in the exact size of your caliper bolts.
- Brake cleaner liquid or spray
- An old toothbrush
- A Phillips screwdriver
- A flat-headed screwdriver
- Copper grease
- Bungee cords
- A pair of pliers
- A torque wrench
- A 3/8-inch ratchet
- Compatible brake fluid.
How to Change the Front Brake Pads?
Once you have everything in order, you’re ready to change your brake pads. Remember, this is not a highly challenging job. As long as you have half a decent toolkit and know how to turn a spanner, you’re good to go!
Assemble the New Brake Kit
Before starting with the process of changing brake pads, assemble the new ones first. Ensure that you’ve purchased a Harley Davidson brake kit. The pack usually contains everything you need. It has pads, some paste to back the plate, and some templates.
What you want to do first is stick the template onto the metal plate. Don’t stick it on the brake pad. The metal plate is at the back of the brake pad. Once the template is on the metal plate, apply the brake paste in little amounts on the circles and spread it with your fingers.
The pack has a scraper to ensure that the paste isn’t too thick. After applying the paste, take the scraper and remove excess layers of the paste. Once you’ve layered the paste, remove the templates from the metal plates.
Remove the Bike Calipers
Before you begin, lift your bike with a jack so you can access the caliper with ease. You can replace the brake pads with the calipers on, but it’s much safer if you remove them. This will also allow you to inspect the brake systems better.
At the top, the calipers are held by a brake pad pin. The pin is held by a safety clip. Remove the clip with needle-nose pliers and carefully guide the brake pad pinout with an Allen key. As you move down, remove the two main caliper bolts that hold the piece together with your Allen socket. You can now remove the calipers.
Pry the Brake Pads Apart
At this point, we’ve only removed the calipers. The brake pads are still intact. To remove them, take a flat-head screwdriver and pry them apart. Don’t worry about using a little extra force because we’re going to replace them anyway. Spread the pads completely apart.
Once the pads are spread out, take the Allen socket and remove the brake pad pin. This allows the pads to slide off easily.
Clean the Calipers
After riding it for miles, your bike could probably do some cleaning around the brakes. This is where your old toothbrush comes in handy. Now that you’ve removed the old pads, clean the old calipers with a cleaner and your toothbrush. Get rid of all the dirt from the calipers and check them for any other problems like rust or pitting.
After cleaning them, you can either leave them out to dry or wipe them with a clean towel.
Inspect the Rotor
If your old brake pads wore out completely and erased the grooves, you would have metal-to-metal contact with your rotor and brake pads. You’d have grooves all the way around. If that’s the case, then you need to change your rotors too.
To ensure that the rotors are working well, spin them slowly to ensure they aren’t warped. They should move in a smooth symmetrical motion.
Clean the Rotor
Your rotors will have accumulated layers of dust and grime from all the miles you’ve traveled. Therefore, you must clean the rotors to ensure that your brake pads have a smooth and clean surface to work on.
You can clean the rotor with a brake cleaner and a Scotch-Brite pad followed by wiping it down with a clean cloth. You want to remove extra grime from the rotors. It’s best if you don’t skip this step.
Put the New Brake Pads In
Take the new brake pads and place them in the caliper. Make sure they’re placed the same way as the old pads were. If you’re using gloves, make sure they’re new so you don’t get any grease or oil on them. Oil can damage your brake pads.
Once the new pads are in place, replace the brake pad pin at the top of the caliper.
Set the Caliper onto the Rotor
The next step is to place the calipers on the rotors. This is why we haven’t used the main caliper bolts yet. Once you’ve placed the caliper on the rotor, take the caliper bolts and fit them snugly in their sockets. Remember, we’ve placed the brake pad pins. Now you need to fit that in snugly too.
Ensure that you torque all these fasteners. Each bike model’s parts have unique torque settings, so consult your manual to find the right settings for your torque wrench.
Now, check your brake fluid level by pumping the brake lever. If you need to drain excess oil, now would be a good time to do it. Lastly, put your safety retaining clip back in on the brake pad pin.
Test Your New Brake Pads
After replacing your brake pads, bed in your brakes by making multiple stops at higher speeds. This will help the brake rotor to perform at its best because it now has the new brake pad material on it. This reduces brake vibrations and squeals when you slow down or stop.
Disc brake systems need to go through a break-in period (a process called ‘bedding-in’) before they can function optimally.
Remember that your new pads will take time to adjust to the brake rotors and may even take a few hundred miles before they do.
What You Need to Know Before Changing Your Brake Pads
Create a Dedicated Workspace
Create a space where you place all the nuts and bolts from the calipers and the brake pads. That way you know exactly where you’ve kept the parts and won’t risk losing them.
If you have space, we recommend that you create two workstations. One to collect and work with the bike parts and another to set up your new brake pads. This will let you access each part with ease and avoid confusion.
Purchase the Correct Brake Pads
Once you know that your brake pads need changing, remember to buy brake pads that are meant for your model. Each bike comes with unique brake pads. If you have a Harley Davidson Softail, then purchase brake pads that are meant for that model.
FAQ
Damaged brake pads are a safety risk to your bike and yourself. They will eventually wear out. If you don’t change them you may risk damaging the discs on your bike which can cost a fortune to repair.
Apart from regular check-ups at the mechanic, replacing your brake pads yourself takes a few minutes and saves you a lot of money.
You’d be surprised by how many people don’t take care of their brake pads. Not taking care of your brake pads naturally causes them to wear out faster. If you don’t check them regularly, the material will wear out, leaving only the metal pad. This drastically reduces your bike’s braking power. It’s a mistake you can’t afford to make – especially on a motorcycle where safety is paramount.
Before replacing your brake pads, understand that poorly looked after brake pads corrode faster. This can cause the caliper and even the caliper pistons to stop working properly.
In short, not maintaining your brake pads is a disaster waiting to happen.
A dead giveaway that your brake pads need replacement is when they become worn and ineffective. If you think your brake pads are worn out, take a ruler and measure the width of the brake pads. If they are two millimeters or less, that means they need to be changed – although poor braking performance will be noticed earlier.
Most brake pads have an indicator groove that’s installed on the surface. The indicator helps people with zero mechanical knowledge understand when the grooves on their brake pads wear out.
If you regularly check your pads, you’ll notice how the grooves wear down and disappear with time. After a while, you’ll need to change the brake pads.
Conclusion
Your bike, like every other machine, needs to be taken care of. Brake pads are one of the most important parts that need checking now and then. After all, you don’t want to endanger your life by riding with worn-out brake pads.
Now that you know how, go ahead and replace those old brake pads yourself.