Handbrake Failure
 

hey my mate rang me about an hour ago and told me he had written off is new rubi...WHAT..! well he said that he was wheelin in the hills and after an hour or so decided to pull up for some lunch, he found a nice spot by the water...so he gets out of his jeep handbrake on (car running to let cool down) and starts to walk to the back of the car and it starts its runaway...right into the drink. so now the insurance company is investigating wether or not it was intentional, and jeep...well ofcourse they have wiped there hands of it, i told him to have an independent mechanic check the handbrake but he says the insurance company wont let anyone touch it, is there a handbrake issue? i know my jk i have to almost rip the handbrake through the console for it to grab..thoughts please.

the handbrake on my jk 4 door is shocking !!!!! it may as well not be there lol luck its a auto thank god for park :P

sorry to hear about your mate by the way hope it all gets sorted !

My hbrake is awesome....holds on very steep slopes with only little application force. Tested it on the mundaring power line track a few weeks ago.

Sorry to hear about your mates Rubi, hope it gets sorted too!

Matt.

My thoughts are, buy the write off back & transplant the good bits into good standard JK,
all jeep handbrakes are crap but there wont be a come back on jeep !!

I recall a link on one of the JK forums to recalls & publications, & one referred to handbrake failure. May or may not be applicable.

On another note, it is not unique to Jeep. My neighbours Ford drove itself down towards her house after she put the handbrake on. We are on the low side of the street, (the roof of her 2 storey house is roughly level with the street). It went over a rock ledge & nose dived into the garden a few feet down & wrote itself off. Luckily it didn't keep going & hit the house. That was the first time she had heard of Fords having useless handbrakes as well.

I suspect that part of the issue is that you get used to how little pressure you need with power assisted brakes, but the handbrake is unassisted, and so need substantially more pressure to work effectively. And most people never realise until it is too late. I tend to pull the handbrake on & hold clutch in. If the car moves at all, pull on another notch, until it stops. Usually, then with engine off, leave it in gear.

mine used to be great, then the damn thing broke while 4wding... now it is shit. No matter how much I tighten it, it still doesnt grip properly. I wont leave it anywhere parked without it being in gear. Just dont trust it.

Mine's the same. You've got to pull the handle almost vertical to get it to grip. Even when you feel some tension on the handle it's still lousy.