[StickyTeflon]

My wife has a CRF230 and was complaining about the front brake not working right. so i rode it and she was right. the front brake seems to lock up very easily. its like its either "on" or "off", no feathering or fade. Its made worse in a turn because of this. she has almost dumped her bike several times. I thought she was just having trouble geting use to the brake. But after riding it.. its a death trap.

So i've changed the brake fluid and looked at the pads. they look ok???

Any ideas??? I sure could use some help.

Thanks
Sean

[riderjohn]

Have you checked for a warped disc? Maybe the brakes lock up when the pads hit a bent place in the disk. The 230 disk is pretty skinny and bent fairly easily. My CRF230 had a bent area that caused my brake to pulsate but it didn't lock up. I got really lucky when I figured I had nothing to lose and put the jaws of a big adjustable open end wrench over it and very carefully applied pressure in the right direction. I didn't expect that to work but it actually removed the pulsating entirely!

[gal8x]

I recently noticed a problem with my front brake too. The caliper sub-assembly was not floating. It was locked in such a way that only one of the brake pads was being used fully. The pads were not that old, one is fine but the other is nearly gone.
I removed the sub-assy and greased the bushing pins. I won't get a chance to test them for another week.

[Beast Rider]

My crf230 has the same brake problem, there is no room for play...stop short or nothing. I learned to use the back brake very early on and am just now beginning to use the front. When I try to use the front brake I also turn the throttle at the same time and get myself in a big mess. We have decided that my hand is too small to reach the break correctly and my husband is going to try a different lever that has more adjustments. I have been complaining about this for 3 years. Hope this solves the problem.