Tighten your Balance Bar!

[RoadRacer]

All of this is (my) user error, but there are lessons to be learned! I always like sharing my cockups because we all make them

TDLR; check and tighten all the locknuts on the balance bar assembly!

I get in my car this morning to drive to a cars-n-coffee, and there are very poor brakes at end of my driveway. I drive my car hard and fast every day, so this is unusual, but it feels like only the rears are working (which are of course the worst brakes on the car). Anyway, it's 7am sunday I drive carefully to the meetup and carefully back.

Back home, I remove the inspection panel above the pedal box and look in (this is the after photo unfortunately):

balance bar.png

First, the bias looks way off. the threaded balance bar (running vertical in this photo) is sticking out the rear mc side (top in photo) as far as it can go. Hardly anything on the front mc side. At (A) The nylon washer looks weird and it's all puckered up. Huh? When I look closer, the internal spherical bearing and nut is jammed HARD up against the nylon and rear mc bar.

Here's a better view of the internals. (If you didn't know, adjusting the balance bar by turning the threaded bar moves that bearing left and right inside the pedal, so the pedal pushes a little more on one side than the other)

raw balance bar.png

In my case that arrow'ed nut was jammed up against that black piece so hard that the whole thing is locked up. Only the rear master cylinder is getting any juice. I'd effectively given it maximum rear bias, and then stopped the balance bar even pivoting anymore.

It wasn't like this the last time I adjusted the brakes, but I noticed that locknut (B) was loose. So I can only assume that the constant vibration and brake pedal movements rotated my balance bar over time? It's been 5-6,000 miles since I adjusted this.

So, tighten locknut (B) after you set the brake bias! (duh)

Yes, dumb I know. But bear with me, it gets worse.

I then set the balance bar up so it's got some front bias - might be hard to tell from the first pic, but there's more thread exposed on the front mc (bottom of photo) now. The bearing is probably 2/3 to the front inside the pedal.

Then I noticed that the rear master cylinder rod (C) was longer than the front (D) - again, wrong! The front rod should be longer at rest, and then the bias pushes it back faster so it catches up and passes the rear. Hard to explain so here's the manual. Again, it's the locknut. I wouldn't have believed it but the rod wound itself out over time (or I suppose I was smoking something that day?). So I had to adjust it back in and tighten up the locknuts C&D again.

The funny thing was that I hadn't noticed the brakes getting worse over time but as I go faster in the car I haven't been terribly impressed with brakes recently and have been talking to people about bigger brakes. Now it seems like I have brand new brakes! With a newly adjusted (AND TIGHTENED) balance bar it feels amazing again.

(BTW, it's not obvious from the photo, but I do have the required 0.2" total gap between the washers)

[sread]

Perfect timing - I was just starting to play with the bias on mine trying to dial it in. You must not have ac in your car because in my car the ducting for the defrost and dash vent is right in the way and has to be moved to even see the balance bar now. Its all I can do just to loosen the jamb nut and try to move the balance bar one way or another.

[RoadRacer]

Perfect timing - I was just starting to play with the bias on mine trying to dial it in. You must not have ac in your car because in my car the ducting for the defrost and dash vent is right in the way and has to be moved to even see the balance bar now. Its all I can do just to loosen the jamb nut and try to move the balance bar one way or another.

Yeah no windows

[jimmish]

Had a similar balance bar issue. Year and a half ago at Lebanon Valley Dragstrip I did a line lock burnout, released the button, and the car wouldn't move. At first I thought I blew the trans but noticed the front wheels were locked up. Track personel had to use go-jacks to get me off the starting line. I thought the line lock may be locked so I removed the fuse - nothing. Then I opened a front bleeder screw and I heard a POP then the car rolled. Got it home and luckily I have made a removeable dash (via dzus connectors). Found that the pushrod from the balance bar to the front master was bent down and jammed against the pedal frame, locking the front brakes. Sent pictures and called Wildwood and their response was Gee, we've never seen that happen before! Yeah, well luckily it happened on the starting line, not 20 minutes ago at top end doing 130 mph. Asked FF that since every kit rolls (ships) out their door with $2k + worth of Wilwood products maybe they can get some answers. No luck. never did like the balance bar setup. If not for my removeable dash, it would be a nightmare replacing it from the floor. I ended up using a floor mounted single master that required moving the steering column, and a bunch of other mods. Last month at the PRI show I discussed the problem with Wilwood reps and they said they have seen if not adjusted the bar shifts left or right. but never up or down. Still no answers. P.S. when ordering a new pushrod to correct the problems they had the nerve to charge me $6. Aerospace brake components look pretty good now.master 1.jpgmaster 3 - Copy.jpg

[nelsond003]

Literally was just talking about this with Paul B the last two days. Seems like I was also hitting the Eagle Rare a little too much on brake installation day. I took a video of how much slack I had in the bar but for some reason I didn't tighten the gaps to the recommended slack and just bolted it right up. been dealing with ****ty brakes since day one. Now I have the daunting task of drinking more while I attempt to remove one of the MCs to correctly do something I should of done in the first place. I promise I will learn from my mistakes and build my second one more sober, lol.

[AC Bill]

Never had to deal with that component before, but is it possible to use nylock nuts instead of the supplied ones?