Performance Bikes — March 2018

79 PERFORMANCEBIKES.CO.UK | MARCH 2018

PB’S

GUIDE TO

BRAKES

HERE COMES THE SCIENCE BIT

BRAKE MOD WISDOM

OBSESSED ASwearewithgoingforward

fast,we’reequallyconcernedwiththe

business of slowing and stopping as quickly

and as controlled as we or the circumstances

might desire or dictate.

Braking systems have come a long way in the last 20

years or so and we also have access to an aftermarket of

brilliant components, not least in the field of front brake

master cylinders.

However, sometimes the results don’t always live up

to the expectations, as our own Kar Lee found out when

he changed the master cylinder on his Aprilia Tuono V4

Factory in the December 2017 Issue.

Words Alan Seeley | Photography Simon Lee

MASTER OF

YOUR DESTINY

How do master cylinders work, and which is best for optimum

stopping power? PB gets balls-deep in the science of braking

Taking effect

The hydraulic multiplier effect is at the heart of

understanding what goes on in a brake system and

informs the changes we might make to a stock set-up

and the differences they will make.

Imagine a master cylinder and a caliper as two

syringes of unequal bores – small for the MC and large

for the caliper as represented by their piston sizes –

connected by a tube (a brake line). Our syringes and

tube are filled with fluid and all air has been expunged.

When pressure is put on a liquid it moves equally in all

directions; fluid is pretty much incompressible, too.

What this means in our closed system is that when an