tortuga

Something was not releasing right. Caliper guide pins well lubed? Did you clean them out before re-lubing? Do the pistons move freely?

Is the other side the same way? Compare the two sides closely, especially if the other side is fine.

yeah those are actually powerstop rotors. me and charlie have the ones for stock setups front and rear. i love them

deekster_caddy wrote:

Something was not releasing right. Caliper guide pins well lubed? Did you clean them out before re-lubing? Do the pistons move freely?

Is the other side the same way? Compare the two sides closely, especially if the other side is fine.

My guess is a probem with the caliper pucks binding when applied and releasing too slow. Might need to replace or overhaul caliper.

Remember to lube sliding points on pads too.

Slide pins are rusted, damaged or not lubed. Floating portion of caliper wasn't applying friction to the outside of rotor. The caliper should slide on the bracket by hand. Remove pins, clean, re-grease, replace boots.

This wasn't the fault of the pad or the rotors being defective. They probably won't cover you under warranty.

The guide pins are moving freely. When I did the brakes last april-ish, both calipers were replaced with new cardone remans which came with new sliding hardware and I cleaned & re-lubed the pins with brake grease. I'll make sure they can float nicely once I get the new brakes on but if the pins are sliding fine, I don't suspect that'll be an issue.

AA wrote:

This wasn't the fault of the pad or the rotors being defective. They probably won't cover you under warranty.

You're right about the warranty coverage but often, they'll "take care of the customer" anyway, as I remember from my auto parts days. Trust me, they aren't suffering from the 1 in 2,000,000 guy who saves receipts and the car and replaces brake pads once or twice free over a fair period of time.
I called up that Brakemotive place and they do not allow walk-in purchases - it's like strictly a warehouse so I just put in the order this morning and hope I get the brakes in a couple days since now I'm stuck driving the turd truck to work once again. I went with the extra $10 to get their pads as well in case O'Reilly doesn't want to help me out with my PF pads.

If you checked the pins and they're working, then that changes things. Could be a defective pad liner, or you exceeded the pad's working temp. Strange that it only effected the inside pad, though.

If you replace the pads and it happens again, could be the square seals are not working, causing the pistons not to retract. This would cause dragging of the inside pad. It's unusual that seals on both pistons would fail at the same time. I'd expect to see tapered wear in a situation where only one seal fails.

AA wrote:

If you checked the pins and they're working, then that changes things. Could be a defective pad liner, or you exceeded the pad's working temp. Strange that it only effected the inside pad, though.

That's what I'm sayin. The pins are perfect. I'll be conscientious when I go to compress the pistons to see if anything is weird with that but I really doubt it. I wouldn't say I'm hard on the brakes either. I do some braking from high speeds from time to time, sure but I'm pretty nice to them in general.

turtleman wrote:

The guide pins are moving freely. When I did the brakes last april-ish, both calipers were replaced with new cardone remans which came with new sliding hardware and I cleaned & re-lubed the pins with brake grease. I'll make sure they can float nicely once I get the new brakes on but if the pins are sliding fine, I don't suspect that'll be an issue.

if you had Cardone remans you'd really better check those pucks. I had a set with pucks that had corrodes and jammed somewhat in the bores. I traded in those calipers on another set of Cardone remans...

For those of you who like details (from http://www.autos.com/auto-repair/what-you-should-know-about-brake-piston-repair):

Piston Inspection and Polishing

You have the calipers off the vehicle and the pistons out. Now it's time to take a close look at the pistons to see if they're still usable.

• Determine what the piston is made of. If it's a phenolic piston and shows any damage whatsoever, it must be replaced. If it's aluminum, minor imperfections can possibly be polished out. Use a screwdriver and scratch the base. If you leave a tiny scratch in the surface, like a small gouge, then it's aluminum and can be worked. If no mark is left, then it's phenolic, and has to be replaced if there is any damage to it.
  
• Inspect them carefully for deep nicks and scratches. If any are found, the piston must be replaced or it will leak.
  If very tiny scratches are found in the side surfaces, a very fine (150 grit and above) sandpaper can be wrapped around the piston and the piston can be twisted. Wet paper and brake fluid is highly recommended. If a minor amount of polishing doesn't remove the imperfection, replace the piston.
  
• Thoroughly clean the piston and caliper bore with brake cleaner.
  If the damage or imperfection to the piston is too bad to remove with a very quick polishing, then it's too deep and will cause a leak no matter what.

Inspect and Hone Caliper Bore

For this step, you'll need a caliper hone or brake hone of suitable size to fit in the caliper bore and a drill. You'll also need brake fluid and some rags. During the cleaning and honing process, be sure to wear safety glasses. Brake fluid and cleaner is very harmful to your eyes so keep your fingers away from your and others' face and eyes.

1. Inspect the bore thoroughly. If any nicks or ridges are found, the bore will require honing.
   
2. Secure the hone in the chuck of the drill and close the hone enough to fit in the bore. Lubricate the sides of the bore and the hone stones with some brake fluid.
   
3. Start the drill and keep it running for approximately 30 to 45 seconds, using an in and out motion as the stones are in motion.
   
4. Thoroughly clean and inspect. Repeat if necessary. If more than 2 or 3 honing sequences are required, the caliper should be replaced, because it might leak. Make sure the seal groove is cleaned very thoroughly. An old toothbrush works great for this.

Reassemble

For this step you will need brake assembly lube. Use nothing but assembly lube for brakes. Component damage and fluid breakdown will occur otherwise.

1. Coat piston seal with assembly lube and seal into groove in caliper bore, chamfered edge towards the bottom of the bore.
   
2. Liberally coat piston with assembly lube and using a rotating motion, insert into piston bore with closed end facing in.
   
3. Attach hose to caliper and install new pads.
   
4. Assemble caliper to steering knuckle and tighten hose and bolts.
   
5. Thoroughly bleed system to remove all air bubbles.

Knowing what type of material makes up your brake piston will allow you to determine whether you can polish out some very minor imperfections or replace it right away. Some mechanics will tell you that no matter what, if you find even very fine scratches on an aluminum piston, it has to be replaced. As long as you don't change the shape or size of the piston, very minor scratches can possibly be polished out. If you read and follow these instructions, you'll know whether you can repair or replace your piston.

I got the rotors from Fedex today and got the brakes put on. ORLY auto parts warrantied my PF pads without asking me a single question about it. I bought a new hardware kit while I was at it. I decided to give the Brakemotive powerstop ceramic pads a whirl though. I have the replacement PF pads as spares. I documented everything I could on the parts. The rotor blanks aren't anything special - usual chinese stuff with nice machine work on them and the zinc coating seems legit so far. I didn't really notice anything too unusual compressing the pistons back in but I opened the bleeder while I did it and when I got the pistons most of the way in, I started seeing some pretty nasty lookin blackness in the fluid on both sides. So after installing the new brakes and whatnot, I just bled the fronts after changing the fluid in the master cyl. There's still some debris in there and whatnot that I don't really know how to clean out other than taking the master cyl off and everything. When I have some more time I might get back into that and try to bleed the system more and get more fresh brake fluid in there. Where does the black shit come from though? Kinda wondering if its somethin with the Cardone caliper piston issues above?

That black shit is the brake fluid being hydroscopic - absorbing water and turning to crud. Whenever I do brakes I suck out the reservoir, fill it with clean brake fluid, then suck it out again and all kinds of crap comes out. Change/bleed out your brake fluid more often to avoid the black crud.

deekster_caddy wrote:

That black shit is the brake fluid being hydroscopic - absorbing water and turning to crud. Whenever I do brakes I suck out the reservoir, fill it with clean brake fluid, then suck it out again and all kinds of crap comes out. Change/bleed out your brake fluid more often to avoid the black crud.

Alright thanks - I didn't know that was a normal product of water-saturated brake fluid. I did suck out the fluid in the master and refilled before I bled it but I'll get more fluid and do it more thoroughly and also hit the back calipers and everything soon.

Found a delightfully tacky yet unrefined place to stick my nitrous purge exit Now I don't feel like it'll just blow itsself off as soon as I try t use it so I'll wire up the purge and get it done. Before I had a nylon tube retainer holding the nozzle which I'm pretty sure would have just broken off after one or two times getting super-frozen by the nozzle. I actually took that windshield wiper rest off and brought it to work where I made a small insert out of aluminum to fit inside the plastic and threaded it for the nozzle to hold it nice and secure. So I guess you can say delightfully tacky however refined! I ordered a couple specifically-sized switches from china to conceal (more like camouflage) in the cabin and wire up the solenoid. If these guys ever send me back my pillar, I'll be able to put in the nitrous pressure gauge and the whole system will be as done as I have any plans for.



Sorry I guess I didn't take any pics of the aluminum piece inside I made lol It was actually fairly intricate.

Nice! Need a shot w/ vapor shooting out of the cowl area!

Codith, you're my hero.

That is pretty cool.

You do know that kind of nitrous purge is just for looks and making you waste nitrous, right? You can just tap the nitrous trigger in Neutral a couple times and let the engine rev free to purge.

deekster_caddy wrote:

You do know that kind of nitrous purge is just for looks and making you waste nitrous, right? You can just tap the nitrous trigger in Neutral a couple times and let the engine rev free to purge.

Thus far that's kinda what I've been doing but I don't like it. Talk about confusing the pcm

Codith, are you going to make it to Lexington?

charlieRobinson wrote:

Codith, are you going to make it to Lexington?

 Lexington? What's happening in Lexington?

Aw I have less than no vacation this year so I'm definitely not gonna make it.  

My car sitting at PRJ's house after we pulled it back there with a tow strap
That black fiero gt is urgently for sale btw

So anyway I went down there saturday morning so we could work on tuning and ironing out issues with the car. We did several pulls to the topish of 3rd. I had a consistent spot of KR right in the shift to 3rd which was some torque management problem apparently. The part throttle KR that I always have is false, Paul agrees. Otherwise with a 2.7 pulley on a high comp block, no KR at the top ever is pretty awesome! I peak 15psi depending on weather. Anyway, that's the good part. When we were kinda getting close to done for the day, we did another pull and I don't even think I got into 2nd gear, and something let go. We don't know if it's the input shaft or chain yet but really either way, the trans is coming out and getting a full rebuild/upgrade. Unfortunately we couldn't pull the trans at Paul's because his garage already had two cars waiting for shit. I'm going to have to get it towed about 120mi up to Fort Wayne, IN so TEP can do it start to finish when Dave comes back from his vacation next week. He was in disbelief when we told him the mods and how long the trans lasted thus far. lol

My first rental car to get home - what a pathetic vehicle