How to improve 929 front brake lever feel?

True, you need a reservoir, about 10 bucks, tubing, maybe 5 bucks? A bolt, another few bucks. Still not near $500. You don't have to buy Brembo's really expensive mounting bracket, there's more cost effective solutions. My gsxr has a Nissan radial master and it's junk. That may not be the case for all Nissan radial masters, though, if they are what comes on other makes of bikes, as folks seem to really like the stock Yamaha masters (I don't know what brand Yammie comes with stock).

you definitely have a problem if the brakes aren't grabbing right away. once you start pulling the lever there should be resistance which is just the fluid getting pushed through the system

FWIW, the lever travel prior to engagement on my 929 was a lot further than the travel on HG's 954, both equipped with the same SS lines and stock pads. It worked fine, it just had more travel. The 19x18 Brembo has quite a bit of travel as well, so don't expect less travel should you decide to upgrade to the Brembo 19x18. The 19x20 should have less, but I don't know for certain, as I haven't tried one.

Stew, a lot of lever travel AND mushy lever indicates the pads need to be replaced and the system bled. My HRC pads are pretty worn and need to be replaced so I get a fair amount of travel, but the lever is rock solid when it reaches the resistance point when applied.

I agree. That seems to be exactly what I have had to do in the past, even though there is still 2-3mm of wear groove showing on pads. Seems only pads readily available locally are EBC HH pads. I have always used OEM and am happy with their performance. I have never used EBC HH. If necessary, I will order new set of OEM pads. I'll find out tomorrow when I bleed brakes. THanks.

I always found the stock pads for that bike to be excellent. Not heard great things about the EBC HH, but I've never used them. I use Vesrah RJL now and like them.

EBC HH are great for the street IMO, but have waaaay to much initial bite to them for track use. YMMV.

Heehee, shoulda warned ya that it wasn't the gixxer you rode at Schwantz School. LMAO. Calipers and rotors are stock, it has SS Galfer superbike lines, and Vesrah RJL pads, which are considered a street/trackday pad.

I have the same Brembo on my 929. I like the feel it provides. Plus it looks damn cool.

I bled my breaks today. Lever engagement point moved significantly out, away from handle bar and lever is firm. I just went for a quick ride and , the brakes and lever feel perfect, even without installing new pads, which means... I have 3 sets of half used brake pads that need to be finished off! Btw, i don't really know how used my pads are exactly but there is just a hair under 3mm of frictionnpad material and 2mm of wear groove remaining on stock honda OEM pads. So if anyone has a new set or knows how thick pad material is when new, let me know. Just curious

Here is what I did:
1. Remove calipers from forks, remove brake pads from calipers
2. Clean around each piston, where they enter caliper with tooth brush and brake cleaner. Mine were not too dirty, imagine that :O
3. Suck out all old amber fluid out of reservoir up top using mighty vac.
4. Push each piston all way into caliper as far as they will go. As you push one in, it may push previous one you pushed in back out. If that happens go back and push them all, all the way back in. I used my fingers and a piece of plastic to get pistons flush with calipers, I tried using a socket placed in the hollow of each piston, and then pushed on that with a piece of scrap aluminum bar to see if pistons would go under flush but they don't really, not by much anyway. Point is make sure you push thiem in as far as they will go. As you do this, the fluid in calipers will be pushed out, up the lines into reservoir, so keep an eye on this so you don't spill. My two calipers with all 8 pistons bottomed out filled reservoir between 1/2 to 2/3 with fluid.
5. Suck this old fluid out of reservoir. Keep cap on reservoir loosly to keep foreign material from getting in it.
6. Reinstall brake pads into calipers and reinstall calipers onto forks/rotors.
7. Fill reservoir with new brake fluid. At this point there is still old fluid in lines so....
8. Attach mighty vac to one caliper bleeder, open the bleeder and suck the old fluid out of the line with mighty vac. As you do this, new fluid is drawn from bowl down line to bleeder. Once you see nice clear clean fluid coming out, close bleeder and perform same operation on other caliper. Add new fluid as needed to reservoir.
At this point, you have minimal old fluid in calipers, new fluid in reservoir, new fluid in lines.
9. start slowly pulling and releasing brake lever. It will come back to bar maybe 20 times before fluid pushes pistons out to where they start to squeeze pads onto rotors. With new pads, this will take less lever actuations.
10. Once lever firms up and pads are grabbing rotors, perform usual bleeding procedure. I slowly, deliberately squeeze brake lever and release about 5x then squeeze and hold lever, open bleeder, lett lever come 2/3-3/4 way back to bar, close bleeder, release lever. Squeeze brake lever 5x again and repeat this process about 5x until you see pure fluid, no air bubbles, coming out clear tube connected to bleeder. repeat this on other caliper. You will feel brake lever firming up and not travelling as much.
11. At this point, your lever should be firm and have moved outboard, away from handle bar significantly! That's it.

I never actually opened my banjo bolt bleeder up top on Master. Didn't need to. Now my brake lever feels solid and brakes feel smooth and powerful.

The obvious things apply here, cover your gas tank to protect it from any brake fluid. handle brake fluid carefully, watch what you touch if you have brake fluid on your fingers etc...

Thanks everyone for all your input!

As far as the old pads, keep a set for a spare just in case. But the thicker your pads are the more material you have on them is more material to absorb heat and surface area to cool it and not transfer the heat to the fluid in the caliper.

I'm sure LTL can explain it better than I, but the thicker pads are better IMO.

Hammer,

This is true. I just hate throwing stuff out that is less than half used up. Plus what you say might make more of a difference if I was fast enough and braked late and hard enough to where brake heat was that much of an issue! The older I get, the slower I get!