My 2013 rancher has about 300 miles and about 75 hours on it. I've got a couple questions about it. The front brakes have started to squel pretty bad. I looked through the rims and there looks to be plenty of pad left. I do tend to mainly brake with the front brakes. This is 90% a working unit I use to pull a small atv disc plow for food plots, other than that I ride the kids around the neighborhood a little. Should I need new pads already? Also, is it about time for valve adjustments? I'm very mechanically inclined, don't think it would be to hard to do, but is it something I could get in trouble with real quick? This is the only atv I've ever owned and beside oil changes haven't had to do anything to it.

 

If there is plenty of "meat" left on the pads they don't need changing. 'Tis said that "squeaky brakes are good brakes" but, with so little use, the caliper sliders may be sticking. Most Quad calipers are a rather poor design and the pads are held in by pins, which the inside pad slides along, these rust and stick in the caliper making removal difficult. After rounding off the allen screw hole in a few, I found that warming the caliper a bit makes removal a lot easier. Once the pads are out, I re-fit the caliper and try to slide it on it's sliding pins, if it won't, a few taps with a soft hammer sometimes works. Seriously stuck caliper sliders are difficult to free and you may have to remove the caliper to do it, which requires brake bleeding afterwards. When replacing the pad pins, I always remove the rust, coat them with copper grease and replace them "finger tight" so they come out easier next time. At 75 hours your valves shouldn't need adjustment. Honda clearances tend to increase with wear and you can hear that they are getting too big, I must admit I don't check them unless they are noisy, or I have the fuel tank off for another reason.

 

Ok thanks, I'll check that out