Help! Beetle emergency brake

[hambone]

What would cause a Beetle emergency brake to lock up so the handle is incredibly difficult to release? This has happened twice already.

[hambone]

I found this, does it apply?

What usually happens when the pawl runs out of ratchet teeth by pulling it too far is the pawl over rotates, the button goes in too far and it gets stuck as the loop in the rod slips off the round end of the pawl and jams the whole assembly. All you gotta do is carefully rotate the pawl, wiggle the rod a bit to remove it and assemble it again with the loop over the rounded end of the pawl. Sound complicated, trust me, it's easy when you study the mechanism for about 30 seconds armed with the knowledge of how it's suppposed to work.

[hambone]

Also found this:

Pull the e-brake boot off the handle or peel it back enough to access the cable nuts (two 10mm nuts per cable, two cables at rear of handle).

Loosen the nuts off to give your handle more room to pull upwards.
As you pull the handle upwards, a small section of gear-profile is revealed under the handle at the center of the pivot point on the floor below the handle.
This gear is the thing that your e-brake handle "clicks" against when you operate it normally....

The button is part of a longer rod that slides down inside of the handle.
The longer rod has a rounded end on it that looks sorta' like half of a hook.
This hooked-end engages a small arm that is pinned inside the handle that in-turn engages that geared section at the floor.

The arm that is pinned into the handle has spun-around so that it is now upside down and the rounded section that gets caught by the "hooked" end of the button-rod has dropped down and can be viewed below/inside the ebrake handle.
If you take a small screwdriver or something that will fit in-between the handle's sides, you can spin that little arm back around so that the geared edge (that clicks against the geared section on the floor below) will now be visible and downwards.

Here's the tricky part:
You have to hold that little arm with the rounded end upwards inside the ebrake handle WHILE you slip the button-rod back down inside the ebrake handle.
Your goal is to trap the rounded end of that small arm inside INTO the hooked end of the button-rod. Once you do this, you'll be able to press the button further into the ebrake handle and watch as the geared-edge-end of that little arm flexes forward.
DON'T RELEASE THE BUTTON ONCE YOU ACHIEVE THIS.

Now lower the ebrake handle back down with the button pressed in all the way and that little pinned-arm inside the ebrake handle will clear the geared section on the floor. Once you've lowered it all the way down you can release the button and that arm will click into the gear on the floor.

Now retension the e-brake cable nuts. You'll probably have to tighten them more than they were before since they were previously slack enough to allow you to pull the ebrake handle all the way up above that geared segment on the floor.

I like my ebrake handle to have about 3 "clicks" at which point it would be sufficient braking to hold the car from rolling on level ground. If the car was parked on an incline it may take 4 or 5 clicks to hold it still. If you have more than six clicks of movement then your cables need more adjusting or they are stretched-out excessively.

Avoid yanking up on the ebrake handle with excessive force as this only serves to stretch your ebrake cables. Always apply the ebrake in slow steady motion and observe when "enough is enough".
This will prolong the life of your brake cables and help to prevent you from ever pulling the handle up too hard and causing this to happen again...

[hambone]

Not that anybody reads the type1 section, but the problem turned out to be sticky parts. The little ratchet and push button wasn't releasing so I lightly oiled up the gizmos and all is well. 4 clicks.
My wife was crankin down on the lever which wasn't helping matters but she has been instructed now.
Was a chrome e-brake an accessory? I've only seen black before.
Just goes to show you that a car that has been sitting for a few years has a lot of BUGS to work out. BUGS.

[spiffy]

So the wifey was reefin' on it a little too much?

If I had me a Type 1 bug Hammie, I would be all over tryin to figure bugs out with ya'. I just don't have a point of reference right now, CAUSE I GOTS NO BUG *grumble*.

[hambone]

You need one. A winter project can be EASILY found for $500, minimal rust but probably needing mechanical work. I'd be happy to advise any way I can.

[Amskeptic]

You need one. A winter project can be EASILY found for $500, minimal rust but probably needing mechanical work. I'd be happy to advise any way I can.

Hey Hambone, I too have had the ebrake handle blues with a '67 bug. You do not want to ever allow the locking pawl to come free of the teeth. It is annoying to re-orient things. If it was just lubrication that yours needed, let that be an incentive to lubricate every little last thing in your car. Perfect excuses to get out of the house for a little breather abound. . . . .
Colin

[hambone]

Yeah it's nice to have an excuse to actually go out and do something productive to the VW instead of just standing around like a geek admiring it..."oh here comes the neighbor lemme pretend I'm adjusting something"

Funny how an unused VW becomes more problematic than a daily driver. These cars need to be driven!

Thanks for the advice. So many Beetle jobs are hard to see, taking hours for some hidden hook.

[Bookwus]

Hiya ham,

Yep, you're right. No chrome handles. That's aftermarket stuff. And that may go some ways toward explaining the problems you have had. And how are your heat levers working? They too can be disassembled, cleaned, and lightly lubed.

[hambone]

Heat and the levers are great! Had to tighten the nuts tho. I'm not used to a Beetle with both raging heat and a working defroster! All my previous ones had swiss cheese heater channels and stinky heat due to ancient heat exchangers.
Yeah I was wondering about that chrome part. Doesn't seem too chintzy at least. The car was sitting for a couple years so everything got gummy.