Falcon EL i6 98 model - My ex-cab , new engine and most other taxi weared parts are now new.

Problem = Cant stop car easy - lacking power in brakes ( just not stopping as good as other EL's ive driven)

I got the disks machined last week to get rid of the shaking when ii applyed brakes, all disks have heaps of pad left in them , i put a master cylinder or something in about 1 year ago , but its allways been weak in braking .

I drove a NON ex cab EL and the brakes where so powerfull and responsive i was upset my car dident have this trait ( i must have goten used to my brakes so much)

Anyway if i slam my foot on the brake pedal hard it takes a s**t of pressure for my wheels to even lock up . infact its hard to make them lock up , very hard and im not a small bloke. Like you put your foot so hard on the brakes till it hits the bottom and lucky to get it to lock.

What could it be that my brakes are so weak? new disks?? new what? i dont know nothing about brakes ..
i know that you have pads, disks , and something to power them ( the master cylinder?)

Please Give me a 101 on brakes or give me some anal detail on what i should be looking for to fix my problem..

Thanks again boyz, Fkn love you kients.

damn man, i think something might be wrong with your braking system.. every EF/EL i've driven has quite good braking even with stock parts..

first thing its good to learn how brakes work.. that helps a bit, check this site its very good: http://auto.howstuffworks.com/disc-brake.htm

as for your problem it could be a few things, the first thing i'd look at is what brake pads you have. they could cause a huge the difference between excellent and poor braking.. if possible find out from whoever serviced your car what kinda pads you got. I recommend Bendix Premiums, i used to have some crappy pads called 'transpath gold' or something, and i used to have to push my foot quite hard to get any decent braking, but ive got the bendix on now, and stopping power is amazing...

thats the first thing i'd check, if you want to just purchase a set of bendix's only for your fronts and see what kinda difference you have.. (your lookin at approx $100 range or similar off the top of my head)

also, you said the brake pedal has to be pushed till it hits the bottom.. mine never reach the bottom and i dont think this is normal.. you might have some sort of pressure loss in your braking system.. try this little experiment. With your car totally turned off pump the brake pedal up and down and you should start to feel the pedal getting harder and harder. Keep going until you think its not pumping up anymore and pedal only moves a little.. then wait for about 5 minutes, and the pedal should still be hard, ie. no pressure leakage. once again im not an expert but this might be able to tell u something

I'd still place my bets on brake pads.. but if that doesnt solve it, you can get a larger master cylinder (aka booster).. which'l have greater diameter hence greater pressure. Everyone i know (even taxi's) that have changed their booster to a larger one have been mega mega happy with their braking.

What kind of master cylinder did u have put in last year? Stock? brand new/second hand?

another thing it could be is air in your brake system. It may pay to get you local brake bloke to flush your brake system and i would suggest putting super dot 4 in as that helped mine HEAPS

my brake booster split down the side, bloody cheap plastic boosters.
it might have an air leak as suggested also, but if you have a long pedal, i'd be looking at flushing out the brake fluid.

Sounds like your brake booster has had it. I've seen them go before and what you describe it has all the symptoms.

Can you hear any hissing sounds at the rear of the engine when it is idling?

I have a similar problem, I now have slotted rotors and EBC Greenstuff pads and the whole system feels s**t. It felt better stock and a few other stock ELs feel better as well. It looks like the fluid may have something to do with it, not being changed properly at the brake shop. There's only one thing to do, do it yourself!

Yep, sounds like fluid, i dunno what the brake place put in mine but i get a lot of pedal travel now, not enough to worry me, but it is noticably more than it used to have, when i change it next i feel it will be fine once again.
Maybe they didnt bleed your brakes drone?
Did they replace fluid or top up, what fluid they use?

If its taking a lot of foot pressure to press the pedal down I'd say your vacuum booster is either failing or not getting any vacuum.

Check the vacuum line going to the booster, thats the big black round thing behind the master cylinder (sorry if this sounds a little patronising. but you did say you needed a 101 on brakes) if thats ok I would have a brake speacailist check the booster it may need replacing.

If you have air in the brake fluid then the pedal will sink to the floor without much effort or effect. If this is the problem your brake system will need bleeding.

Naa not patronising at all man thanks for your input .

But before i can say i understand my situation , im still abit lost in understanding the differance between the master cylinder and the vacum booster and what they do.

mmm ill do some tests tomorrow and post back and tell you what i know.

ok , i learnt abit about how braking systems work and i kind understand how it all works now. I just have to figure out which part is playing up or not doing its job correctly.

could be glazed pads

i go with the brake booster, it happened to me a few months ago my brakes just would not stop too easy and where very hard.

remove the vacume line from the brake booster to see if you are getting pleanty of suction.
if there is pleanty of vacume, reconect it, with the car off pump your brakes until rock hard with your foot firm on the pedal start the car, the pedal should sink down a bit and becom soft. if its still hard your brake booster is stuffed.

from memory my brake booster was about $329 from repco.

what would this mean?

helpfull ill try that now

I also noticed that when the car is on , i can here like a springy type sound that comes from the brakes when i push them in and out.