Not the way i wanted to start the long weekend..but i am ok.

i have a 2005 Ultra with around 30k on it. i have owned it around 5 years now...never a problem. Yesterday i was in some heavy bumper to bumper traffic (road construction) and noticed the front brake lever getting stiffer. once i got rolling around 40-45 it felt like the bike was losing power. strange as the engine was fine..no mis-fire. i managed to pull over and noticed BOTH the front brake rotors we scorching hot. so both the calipers were dragging.? not much i could do so i checked the brake fluid and it's ok. i called for a tow but it was an hour plus (90*F) and my wife comes out. we wait for a bit and the rotors cool off and the bike will roll. i am about 2 miles from home so i make the mistake of trying to limp it home. i will stay off the front brakes entirely. i get about a half mile down the road and the same scenerio. engine losing power and i have to downshift to keep the engine from dying at 35 mph. i am about 300 feet from a side street when things go from bad to worse. steering gets ugly and i start to smell rubber. it's at this point i realize the the front wheel is completely locked up and... down i go.

Thankfully the wife was behind me and not a cement truck as there is plenty of construction around here. so..plenty of road rash and the bike gets a tow to the dealer.

My question is has anyone ever encountered this? i've been riding over 30 years. it was literally like God himself was putting on the front brakes.
If i'd of been on the highway.. i would be dead.

anyone have any idea what would cause BOTH calipers to lock up together?
thanks....ride safe guys.

 

Never been through something like this. Glad you're ok even if the bike isn't.

First thing that came to my mind was front wheel bearings going, generating the heat you saw in the brakes? Not even sure if that's plausible in reality or not...

 

I'd go with the master cylinder, actually...although frankly, I've never heard of this happening on a non-ABS bike. Bearings...naw...not so much. I doubt that they would transfer that much heat to the rotors. But I would definitely suspect a stuck piston in the master cylinder.

 

 

 

Yes, I did have this happen to me... but only when I added the wrong brake fluid to the front brake reservoir . I blead the system and added new brake fluid, drove about 4 miles and noticed the same thing. Came home with bike on the trailer and research showed that I used the wrong DOT fluid. I will never make that mistake again.

 

Damn, I'm glad you're OK. Hopefully it won't take much to get the bike patched up and back on the road again.

Many years ago, I was headed to work in my Chevy Silverado. The brakes felt kind of "squishy" so I pulled in a local convenience store, grabbed some brake fluid and topped off the reservoir. I start back down the road and noticed the brakes felt firm once again. I go a few more blocks, tap the brake at a stop light and thought...hmm, the brake pedal feels a bit too solid now. I go another couple of blocks and the front tires are locked up.

I check the empty brake fluid bottle that I tossed in the back. Turns out, it was actually Transmission Fluid. The crap was in the same bottle and labeled the same as the brake fluid, just different wording of course. In my haste (and negligence) I wasn't paying enough attention to catch the difference. I ended up putting all new calipers/master cylinder/brake lines, etc on the truck before it was over. Lesson learned...never buy auto maintenance supplies from a convenience store lol.

Again, I'm glad you're OK!

 

 

 

My guess is the bumper to bumper boiled your brake fluid. So both system where like pressure cookers. Should be DOT 5 but it still could have had moisture. I have a friend who owns an old AMF FX kickstart Harley. His front did this years ago and he went down. The bike did not have a lot of miles on it. It's sat in his garage all these years. Still sitting there.