Working of Parking Brake (Hand brake)

The parking brake or the hand brake is the strongest brake system in a vehicle (automobile). This brake is normally used while the vehicle (car) is parking and hence called the parking brake. This brake can be employed using the hand, so also called as hand brake.

Main components of a Parking/ Hand brake (in construction equipment, back hoe loader eg: JCB, CAT:

1.      Hand grip

2.      Cable

3.      Clevis

4.      Calliper liver

5.      Spring

6.      Brake pad

7.      Disc

Hand grip: as shown in the figure, the part where the human hand is engaging with the lever of the brake system.

Cable: connecting the hand grip to the brake system.

Clevis: link of the calliper lever to the brake body.

Calliper lever: it is having a typical shape as shown in the figure. The movement of the calliper liver is resulting in the brake pads to move towards each other resulting g in the brake.

Spring: helps to hold the brake pads away from each other, in normal from the disc.

Disc: this is actually not a part of the parking brake. It as part of the transmission connected to the propeller shaft. This disc is jammed to stop by the brake pads to stop the machine.

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Working of a Parking brake/ Hand brake:

This parking brake activation lever will be fixed in the driver’s cabin, near the driver/operator and will be linked to the paring brake system beneath the chassis of the vehicle by a cable (ref’ fig). This cable will be connected to the calliper lever and intern to the brake pads. As we move the hand grip of the parking brake up or move it towards the driver, the brake will be engaged.

The calliper lever moves up and as it is linked to the brake pad retaining walls, the brake pads move towards each other resulting in the brake of the disc.

As we release the hand lever down (away from the driver) due to the spring tension of the parking brake system the brake pads disengages, resulting in the release of brake.