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So I'd like to get several people to post pics of their drum brakes that they have "vented" and get their opinion on it. My project bike wheels are taken apart and if I decide to vent them I have to do it before powder coat. So what do ya'll have, what have you seen, what have you heard, and what do you think?
i have pics without the drum being installed and without a mesh backing. i did it to my rear drum on my CB350... front is converted to disk.
was very easy... drilled holes between the ridges (if you dont know what your doing, dont cut the ridges) and then made slots with a jigsaw with a wood blade (metal blades clog quickly with the soft alloy). smoothed with a file then buffed.
its a good idea to have a mesh of some sort to keep stray rocks and things out (in the off chance they can find a way in...)
You did a great job! I haven't thought of the mesh that's a good idea... I'm curious about if it gets water in the drum, will it really hurt the braking and how do you get it out?
Is that what you meant? Or did you mean old school venting/drilling into the actual friction material?
I drilled directly through the sides (like drilling rotors) which is an old school hot rod trick, note the hole in the side just under the 85 degree mark. And I vented the casing.
Water will hurt your braking in a major way. I would recommend against this on a bike that may be ridden in the rain.
If I drilled the cover for venting I figured I would have to drill through the liner material as well so that water could get out if any got in. When drilling through the friction part of the liner how do you get in there to chamfered the holes? It looks like in your pictures that you have several holes down the center only, is this correct? Also can you tell a difference with this mod and do you like it?
This will be a street bike so all of this inquire may be a mute point if it's going to be a bad decision for street bike that might possible be ridden in the rain.
That is correct, but it's not the correct way to do it. also remember that the friction liner is not centered in the casing. I stupidly drilled right on the centerline and ended up of to the side of the liner. I have not done it yet but how it will need to be finished will be with more holes to "wipe" the entire width of the pad (more like in that link that I posted) The holes will not be chamfered on the inside but I will lightly sand the edges of the holes so that there's no burr.
This hub's for SixtyNine which is a long term back burner project, so I am far from any road testing.
I must disagree completely with both those statements. I don't know what Rocan thinks the benefits are. If they get wet you will have essentially no brakes (and if there are big holes in the sides and it rains, they will get wet), and I can't imagine having to worry about heat soak on bikes with this little power on the street. If you cut up the sides of the drum casing on a street bike it's for aesthetics, nothing more. That's why I did it, because I want this bike to look like a vintage racer (that's why we like cafe racers right, because they look cool) There's nothing wrong with doing it because you want the look, it would be silly though to lie to yourself and say it's more than that.
If all we cared about was practicality this website would be about increasing the fuel mileage on all our Honda Accords, and that would bore the shit out of me.
On my 450 rear hub the inner liner runs underneath the ridge for the spokes so if I were to drill holes through the braking surface it could only go part way across.
The look of it was my biggest attractant but no matter how much I like the look of it I can't do it if it's going to be unsafe bc this is going to be my wife's bike when I'm done. If it was mine I might not mind quite so much about it. I don't fancy ever hearing her say that her brakes didn't work and that's why she went down!
Just my personal opinion, I would never do that to anything for anyone else before living with it for a significant time myself and developing a fully educated opinion.
mysta, the holes are less wide than my pinky finger... it would be extremely difficult for water to get in there...
they are more aesthetic than performance oriented; ill admit that...
but they have another use besides cooling. Honda Drums get packed with brake dust... these vents give the dust a place to escape. in short, that means not having to pop the rear wheel off every time the back brake starts squeeling.
nathan... long as you avoid the ridges (cut between em) the rear (and front) drum are extremely strong. ive seen people hack more than half the material off the honda hubs and still ride them with apparently no adverse affects.
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