Mountain Biking - Mech disc brake problem

My bike came with mx2 hayes disc brakes and the left pad on the caliper of the front brake seems to be too far from the disc. When I squeeze the brake lever, the lever arm on the caliper touches the arm holding the cable. I tried adjusting the inner pad closer to the disc and now it's rubbing a little and I still can get the arm to touch the cable holder(or however it's called). Is there any way to adjust the inner pad, or maybe the whole caliper?

Yes, there is, but I can't help you. My son had that problem after transferring his disc brakes from on bike to another, and it's easy, if you know how. Keep asking?

Try this first:

Unbolt the 2 bolts holding the caliper to the ADAPTER(not the 2 bolts holding the adapter to the frame), and then pull on the brake lever as hard as you can, then as you're holding it, tighten the bolts back up.

If this doesn't work, you can try pulling out the little screws out of the levers to tighten up the cable and get the pad closer.

I've found the 'loosening' caliper bolts and squeezing on mechanical brakes isn't very effective.
Firstly, you need to make sure that the inner pad (closest to the wheel) is JUST touching or JUST not touching the rotor. You should loosen the caliper mounting bolts (two 5mm allen bolts), and then with your hands, slide the caliper around around in minimal amounts untill the inner pad is correctly in position. Tighten these bolts, spin the wheel an make sure the rotor isn't rubbing on the caliper body.

Next you will need to adjust the outer pad accordinly. This is simply done with cable tension. You should fine tune this at the lever. Screw the black dial where the housing comes into the lever counter-clockwise (outwards). This will TIGHTEN the cable, tightening the brake, moving the outer pad furthur in. If you need to make large adjustment you should pull more cable through at the caliper by loosining the 5mm allen bolt and pulling cable through. If the outer pad is rubbing and you need to loosen it, do the reverse of above.

Hope this helps :)

My brother fell into this same pickle

Try this first:

Unbolt the 2 bolts holding the caliper to the ADAPTER(not the 2 bolts holding the adapter to the frame), and then pull on the brake lever as hard as you can, then as you're holding it, tighten the bolts back up.

If this doesn't work, you can try pulling out the little screws out of the levers to tighten up the cable and get the pad closer.


Thanks Jason, it really solved my problem. The pad isn't too far now and isn't rubbing. Thanks for the info blue neon, I'll keep it mind the next time I have this problem. :D