Handbrake 1.5 keeps breaking at spring balljoint
Dean Robinson
Member
I broke my handbrake late last year and fanatec sold me a replacement part which I fitted yesterday. The part is the ball-joint at the end of the spring, which is attached through the main pivot point of the handbrake. It sheared off at exactly the same place as the last one, except this time it happened the first time I used it. Not impressed.
Anyone else have the same problem and maybe a fix?
Cheers,
Dean
Comments
So, Fanatec’s design is more or less like this
What about trying to find the right combo of hardware to change it to something more like a tie rod end rather than ball and socket. Like this
Thanks Joshua. You'll have to excuse my ignorance here, but given that the bolt shears at the pivot plate, how would the tie rod style prevent that from happening? It seems to me to be a design fault, as really the pivot plate should be sistered to another plate on the other side of the centre spring. That way, you could employ the tie rod similar to your picture above.
I most definitely agree a second plate sandwiching the the tie rod would be best. I was just thinking that with the tie rod you could hopefully get a stronger standalone bolt to use. It would still function as intended. You can use the just one side of the tie rod style. Think of some motorcycle shift shaft linkages.
This is just a literal example of my previous statement
Good point. I'm waiting on a response from Fanatec, although I'm pretty sure they will give me the "out of warranty" line. I may look at another brand. Cheers
Ok, so I'll end this here. The issue is in the design and the shear-stress placed on the bolt. This might be fixed if you angle the handbrake more toward yourself, but if you mount it on the side of the Fanatec shifter, you risk doing what I did (twice). If I break it again, I'll try the Sparco - although I'd prefer to keep all my peripherals the same brand. Thanks for your assistance Josh 👍