Master Hack
Well-known member
Early on in the Franken Kart project I bought a hydraulic brake kit from one of the suppliers listed elsewhere here. The rear caliper came with a parking brake.
My inner cheapskate kicked in and I figured out how to make a parking brake lever for zero dollars. My junk pile saved the day again and I found an old pedal operated parking brake assembly from an old truck. Well they are pretty ugly and I had no room for another pedal. So the problem was how to make a hand brake out of a foot brake. After a couple of failed attempts, I removed the actual mechanism from the mounting plate and stuck it on a piece of 1/4 inch aluminum. The resulting assembly actually works pretty well. I got a HD marine cable to connect the caliper to the new assembly and the rest is history. Yeah, its still ugly and I still can't weld aluminum very well.
The moral of the story, is never throw away "junk" without a few minutes of thought first!
My inner cheapskate kicked in and I figured out how to make a parking brake lever for zero dollars. My junk pile saved the day again and I found an old pedal operated parking brake assembly from an old truck. Well they are pretty ugly and I had no room for another pedal. So the problem was how to make a hand brake out of a foot brake. After a couple of failed attempts, I removed the actual mechanism from the mounting plate and stuck it on a piece of 1/4 inch aluminum. The resulting assembly actually works pretty well. I got a HD marine cable to connect the caliper to the new assembly and the rest is history. Yeah, its still ugly and I still can't weld aluminum very well.
The moral of the story, is never throw away "junk" without a few minutes of thought first!
