Silvering Rear Brake

I've been riding when I can in this uncertain weather here in Lancaster Pa. and now I've noticed that if I leave the bike sit a few days, 2 or 4, that the rear brake drags for the first mile or so in the morning. Then it is fine the rest of the day, even after it sits for 10 hours. Anyone else experience this. I'm thinking it is a stuck caliper but what would cause it to close up and stick after sitting a few days when it's not being touched? Any remedies other than a tear down? I can take it to the dealer but he is book until May 23rd. Thanks!

What miles are on your bike?

I'm currently having the same problems both front, and rear.

Mine were dragging sufficiently to have a serious affect on fuel consumption.

If there is considerable miles on your machine expect to have trouble removing the pad hangar pins, and the screw-in dust covers.

I have pistons out of calipers at the moment, and I'm trying to figure out a way to get them back in, since they don't want to go in easily, even well lubricated with brake fluid.

I have 16,700 miles on the bike. The rear pads were replaced at about 13,000 miles. I had no problems until this spring.

If you put the bike up on the center stand after riding is the rear wheel free to move, or does the brake drag at that time too? Is the parking brake draging? They do have a habit of not releasing fully.

If the parking brake is not dragging i.e. fully releasing, and the rear wheel is still dragging then the caliper pistons are probably not fully retracting. You can remove the caliper and brake pads and pump the brake lever gently to get the pistons to extend a bit and use brake cleaner and a brass-bristled to GENTLY clean any Amish road apples or other crud from pistons, etc. If you aren't comfortable with removing the caliper then just spritz the pistons area (between the back of the brake pad and the caliper body) with brake cleaner and wedge something between the brake rotor and brake pad to force the postons to fully retract so that the cleaner can work it's magic and hope for the best. Oh yeah, don't forget to remove whatever you've wedged in there before to take it for a ride. HTH

Tim

Thanks for the replies...  Once I ride about a mile there is no discernible drag.  I will try your suggestions and let you know.  May take a few days...  I work a lot.

Update: Last night I did as described above. I also manually retracted the calipers a few times. No problems. This morning I checked the wheel and no drag, I start the bike ( which requires depressing the brake) and discovered some drag. I shut off the bike, manually depressed the caliper, started it again and there was rather little drag this time. Clearly, the calipers are sticking.

In disk brake operation the pistons do not retract they merely release their grip pressure and remain touching the disk. When the disk again begins to turn a slight run out of the disk as well as vibration will result in a bit of clearance, not much but enough to push prevent the pads from friction heating. If you apply the brakes and then turn the wheel you should feel some drag or hear the pad sliding on the disk. There won't be any actual clearance until vibrations shake the caliper enough to force a wee bit of clearance resulting the drag. If the calipers were sticking you'd have continuous drag.
Calipers on the SW are not solidly mounted, they are designed to slide back and forth so that the pressure on both pads can equalize. If the caliper sticks in its movement there's no way to relieve the pressure on the inner pad. It's easy to check for stuck calipers, you'll find much more wear on the inner pad.