Modern Vespa

Weird - apparently I forgot to set my emergency brake last night - even though I had the steering locked full left. I discovered this when I went down to install my Cortech saddlebags (more on those later). So I thanked God it hadn't rolled away on me and flipped the emergency brake up and to my surprise it latched! Cool. Not earth shaking but it shows a surprising attention to design.

Jon

I think you can get the emergency brake to function after locking the handlebars but they will unlock as well. To lock the emergency I think you have to set it before locking the handlebars. Then, both lock.

Not so. The parking (emergency?) brake will lock either way. It doesn't matter in what order the two actions are performed.

LOL, yep in the U.S., people commonly call the parking brake an emergency brake. As we are fond of driving, I guess we consider it an emergency any time we have to park a vehicle and walk.

Moving up to larger vehicles, typically with air brakes, we call it a parking brake.

lol - yes - embarrassing - it should be referred to as a parking brake.
Here's a flashback I just had - at one time using the parking brake in turns was taught as a driving technique for certain sport car events - you use it to swing the rear of the vehicle around for very tight curves. Considering the outcome of missing one of those turns at velocity it may well have been justified referring to it as an emergency brake...

if I'm not mistaken the owners man of cars call it a parking brake also. I know the little red circled p on my ford truck means parking.

now why do you park on driveways and drive on parkways?

I don't know if this is still the case, but parking brakes used to be a completely separate system on cars - additional brake pads on the rear wheels activated directly by a cable. Hence, they could be used in an emergency if the regular brakes failed.

Ah, yes, Wikipedia, font of the wisdom of the ages:

"An emergency brake is a separate brake system in a vehicle for use in case of failure of the regular (hydraulic or air) brakes and commonly used as a parking brake in automobiles."

Using the emergency break to help a car turn is a technique that locks up the rear wheels causing them to drift, bringing the rear of the car around in an oversteer. Directions in the link below. (Disclaimer: I can't personally verify how good these directions are, so don't blame me when it doesn't work )

http://www.ehow.com/how_2082546_emergency-brake-drift-car.html

I believe the sport is Gymkhana. Pretty cool if you like the smell of burning rubber.