The hand brake was originally conceived to prevent accidental movement of the car in the parking lot. The system is designed in such a way that when the lever is lifted, the cables clamp the pads and the car remains stationary. Although experienced drivers prefer not to use the handbrake at all, especially in winter. The brake is the inclusion of the transmission with the engine turned off, this not only increases the service life of the parking brake, but also avoids freezing of brake pads in winter.
Handbrake repair is usually remembered before undergoing a technical inspection. There are some of the most likely causes of failure, which you can diagnose yourself:
1) After removal from the handbrake, the rear wheels do not spin for a while, and after a short trip everything returns to normal. This is due to souring of the parking brake cables, which leads to a constant clamping of the brake disc pads . Only a replacement will help fix this problem.
2) The hand brake does not work at all. Most likely, the reason is that the cable has exhausted its resource and, with the next effort, simply burst.
3) You have to raise the lever too high to keep the machine in place. Here, most likely, there was wear of the pads, which led to an increase in the gap between the pad and the brake disc. Replace and if the result does not change much, tighten the cables.
Oddly enough, a broken hand brake is a fairly common occurrence among those car owners who practically do not use it or use it for other purposes. For example, now a huge fashion has gone for the so-called drifting (controlled drift), where novice drivers, after watching a movie, begin to drift without installing their cars at all, which can lead to disastrous consequences. For such entertainment, a hydraulic hand brake is required. Its design is slightly different from the standard, and it is installed additionally, and not instead of the factory. Such a brake will not keep your car on a slope, much less save it in winter, but it will help to save the remaining parts of the
parking brake for their further targeted use.
This, it would seem, a trifle makes life much easier for many drivers, and sometimes saves it. There are cases when only a hand brake saved from imminent death due to a failure of the main braking system. That is why many professional drivers recommend monitoring the health of this mechanism.
It is worth saying that if you find yourself in the above situation, then in no case can you sharply pull the handbrake. Such a reaction will not only not save you, but can aggravate an already problematic moment by sending you into a skid. If you feel that when the brake pedal is pressed, the car does not stop moving, then calmly and as soon as possible you must engage lower gears with a smooth raising of the parking brake up. The gear shift will allow you to brake the engine, and the gradual use of the parking brake will prevent skidding and accelerate the braking process.