master cylinder swap from another bike......

so on my 82 xj, the front brakes seem to be a little weak. i can pull pretty hard and get it stopping pretty quick, but i was thinking of "upgrading" to a newer style of master cylinder.

a friend of mine has a side business of buying wrecked bikes and parting them out, he has at least 100 sitting around, that are all newer above 2000. i might just go root around and pick one up, knowing that i might have to have a custom brake line made.

what i want to know is, are these original master cylinders supposed to feel pretty tight, as in clamping pressure? because mine is "ok". it feels like it is "80's" technology. now i know i only have one piston, and one caliper, but if i were to get a newer style to fit, would it be better or am i just wasting my time?

 

...if it aint broke, don't fix it!

 

I put a m/cyl off a newer 250 ninja on my 650 before i sold it. The yamaha cap actually fit too. I mainly did it because of a handlebar swap that caused the stock m/cyl to lean too far to remove te cap without spilling. Braking performance was about the same.

 

i feel the same way about my brakes. my rear brake foot pedal must be pressed 2 inches in travel and my front hand brake feels old and soft. i have rebuilt the master cylinder and caliper with new pads and fluid but it just doesnt bite very well.

 

Stainless brake line will help tremendously.

 

If you change to a newer master and it has the appropriate amount of volume necessary to fully actuate the piston, then there really shouldn’t be much of a difference because it is only a plunger as such, a push rod…

All you are doing is pushing hydraulic fluid….still to a single piston calliper and same size pad surface, where the braking force actually is…most early to mid eighties bikes had crapy single piston callipers…if you want better braking then you will need to change to larger discs and larger callipers ie 4 or six piston which give a larger pad surface and the pistons are on both sides not just on one, which give a more even clamping force, also as previously mentioned, stainless lines are a good choice, prevents expanding like in conventional rubber lines (spongy brakes)….