Handbrake Stories!

[JayT]

Evening,

After watching Top Gear tonight, the only thing worth discussing is the handbrake topic. I assume that some of you have great stories and this is the thread in which you can do just that;

Mine isn't anything extreme, just snow covered back roads in a Renault Megane. It was fun, but I bet you all have better stories.

Over to you...

[beko1987]

I've never used it for showing off yet. I took the puma out in the snow to an empty car park to learn what happens but didn't go over 30.

Handbrake currently doesn't work in the zx thanks to a snapped cable, so was a letdown this year.

[rallycross]

I went to Waitrose one morning and as I reached the store entrance I realised it was still closed (Sunday morning opening hours).

So without thinking I pulled the handbrake and completed a perfect 180 U turn round the keep left sign in the middle of the road in my RB5 (those old Subaru's had great handbrakes).

The odd thing was this was the one and only time I ever tried doing it in that car. It just felt right.

[LukeSi]

Handbrake on the MR2 doesn't seem to lock the rear wheels. In the Panda I've used the handbrake a number of times.

[Wizardskills]

They forgot to mention when using the handbrake to swing into a parking space you must shout "Like A Glove". I thought everyone knew this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nOxdKcqC_I

[JayT]

LukeSi said:

Handbrake on the MR2 doesn't seem to lock the rear wheels. In the Panda I've used the handbrake a number of times.

Any good stories in the Panda?!

[bennyboysvuk]

Back in 1996 before I owned a car, it was coming up to Sunday lunch and it was identified that we had no gravy so I volunteered to go out and get some in my sister's Metro. First stop though was a large empty local car park where I could practice my new art of using the handbrake to drift. I got it a bit wrong though and hit the kerb, causing the tyre to blow out. Following that, I performed the fastest wheel change of my life and went back home having got some gravy with the story of there being a 'long queue' at Spar.

I think that was probably the worst of a long list of moments when playing with the handbrake.

[SWH]

Think you know what you're doing.....?

...try it in a Citroen BX

[NateWM]

I occasionally have a bit of handbrake fun in a large open carpark whenever its greasy.

Best one was coming out of a DIY store, and pulling a handbrake turn going into an empty junction. I somehow time it perfectly, and managed to do a flawless slide into the junction, just missing the kerb by millimetres. I felt like Ken Block for the next 10 seconds.

[Dog Star]

Was in Kos once with the OH and we had a Hyundai(?) Atos rentacar - they are a small but tall car with very skinny tyres.

I did a handbrake turn and I absolutely shat my pants - I swear it was going to tip over . The OH went mental and was smacking me around the head and screaming. Never again!

[Dixie68]

In the 80s, a Cortina Mk3 with L plates, a gravel car park by the beach on a hot summer's day, and my licence-holding brother in the passenger seat. I drove too fast into the car park and my brother shouted causing me to panic and yank the handbrake on. The car slid the width of the car park and slotted perfectly between two parked cars and stalled. We both jumped out, had a quick sly glance at the cars in front and behind ours to make sure we hadn't damaged them and then wandered off for an ice cream nonchalantly, coolness personified.
It must've looked like a scene from the Sweeney.
As an aside, because I'd stalled it I'd left it in gear and when we got back in to drive off I didn't put the clutch down and managed to bump the car in front when I tried to start it. Not so cool, but fortunately cars were sturdier then and neither was damaged.

[Bear Phils]

Dog Star said:

Was in Kos once with the OH and we had a Hyundai(?) Atos rentacar - they are a small but tall car with very skinny tyres.

I did a handbrake turn and I absolutely shat my pants - I swear it was going to tip over . The OH went mental and was smacking me around the head and screaming. Never again!

Odd, this goes against everything we know about handbraking

[Mr2Mike]

LukeSi said:

Handbrake on the MR2 doesn't seem to lock the rear wheels.

This is pretty much standard behavior for MR2 handbrakes. If it can actually hold you on a steep hill then you have a particularly good one

[McWigglebum3rd]

My old caterham 7 had a hydraulic handbrake installed as i used it for autotesting.

I have had a bking at work for using the rapid steering handle

[DocArbathnot]

SWH said:

Think you know what you're doing.....?

...try it in a Citroen BX

I did once (before I realised the BX handbrake works on the front wheels ;eek:

[omgus]

Mr2Mike said:

LukeSi said:

Handbrake on the MR2 doesn't seem to lock the rear wheels.

This is pretty much standard behavior for MR2 handbrakes. If it can actually hold you on a steep hill then you have a particularly good one

I remember taking my 1st MR2 to he garage complaining it wouldn't hold the car and the Toyota tech just saying "they all do that, if you wanted to leave it on a hill i should park at the bottom as that's where it would end up."

[LotusOmega375D]

I think Lewis Hamilton stole my genuine story and pimped it up with some celebrity name-dropping to try and make himself seem interesting...

Here's what really happened:

It was a dark winter's night in about 1990 and my brother was driving us both back home from the pub in our (t)rusty old 1966 Triumph 1300 winter snotter.

Of course I had imbibed just enough Marston's Pedigree to make me feel invincible. So I suddenly had the great idea of yanking on the handbrake as my brother was driving along a country lane.

Unfortunately this resulted in much swearing and the Triumph ending up nose first in a ditch.

Luckily a farmer was not too far behind with a 4x4 and towed us back out. The only damage done was a detached front number-plate, which I fixed back on the next morning. Our parents never found out about our little excusrion.

[MarkRSi]

omgus said:

Mr2Mike said:

LukeSi said:

Handbrake on the MR2 doesn't seem to lock the rear wheels.

This is pretty much standard behavior for MR2 handbrakes. If it can actually hold you on a steep hill then you have a particularly good one

I remember taking my 1st MR2 to he garage complaining it wouldn't hold the car and the Toyota tech just saying "they all do that, if you wanted to leave it on a hill i should park at the bottom as that's where it would end up."

Mk3 MR2 handbrake isn't much better FWIW


A K11 Nissan Micra, on the other hand...

[Ozzie Osmond]

If you've got a mechanical lever, be very grateful!

Electric handbrake in the latest Porsche cars is utter cack and has no place whatsoever in a sportscar,

• awkward to set and release
• no graduation - it's only full on or full off
• automatic release is slow to let go - can stall the car
• hill hold feature useless - fails to work in most situations where you want it

[telecat]

Funnily enough The Astra has gone back to a Handbrake and the woeful Electric is now an option.