Need some tips, going to be replacing calipers, rotors, pads.

So I’ve had my DA for about a year and a half now… absolutely love the car despite the copious amounts of money I’ve spent to recover her from the abuse by her previous owners.

Since the day I got her, she’s had an intermittent pull to the right when braking, a lot of steering wheel vibration when braking and occasionally during acceleration a hard pull to the right as well. The right wheel well is unusually hot after driving. When I take her to the car wash, huge clouds of steam will come up from the driver’s wheel well but nowhere else. Asked around and had a few people take a look and was told I had a sticking caliper.

But I let it ride, due to a lack of money from the aforementioned recovery work and now she squeaks constantly, and very loudly, unless the brakes are applied (hard) and I’m doing under 10km/hr.

So here I am with a can of Brake-Kleen (They had a red can and a green (Non-chlorinated?) can… I went with red), an unopened bottle of Gunk Dot 3 brake fluid, new front rotors (Lordco brand, they don’t stock Brembo and the price was right), re-manufactured (by Fenco) semi-loaded Nissin calipers, semi metallic Raybestos pads for the front and ceramic Raybestos pads for the rear. All brand new and still in-box. The rear calipers/rotors appear (to my untrained eye) to be doing the trick for now, so they can wait.

Long story short, I’ve been searching and reading around and I have my Helm’s manual on my computer and a Hayes manual in my back seat. I think I’m ready to go but I wanted to know if any of you more experienced folks have any tips or advice before I dive in.

Any assistance, as always, is greatly appreciated.

http://www.g2ic.com/tegtips/brakesus/5.html

Just about all you need to know is right there. =)

It’s all pretty much covered in the Helms, that thing will guide you through all you need. A couple tips:

  1. You may need an impact screwdriver if you can’t get the phillips screws out to remove the rotors

  2. Use a c-clamp if you need to open up the calipers so they can fit around the pads and rotor.

  3. Get a friend to help you bleed the brakes when you’re done

  4. Don’t expect the brakes to work perfectly immediately, it’ll take a little while for the pads to bed. Once the pads are bedded you’ll have your maximum stopping power. Performance pads require a specific bedding proceedure, but since yours are just OEM replacements you can just drive on them until they’re worn in properly.

  5. I like to paint the top hats and outer perimeter of my rotors before installing them so that they don’t rust. I use semi-flat black.

  6. Cheap rebuild calipers may also rust. Mine did, so I had to pull them off, clean them and paint them to prevent the rust. Quality OEM pieces won’t rust (or so I’m told). Again, I us semi-flat black.

^I thought Nissin was the OEM brand for calipers?

Just read Neil’s Teg Tip, brakes are SO easy once you get in there and do it!

just make sure that you have lots of time to do the job. stuff likes to get stuck. and like colin said, make sure you have a big ass c-clamp. you will need it to push the piston back into the caliper, otherwise your new pads won’t be going on.

also, in my experience, the rear calipers tend to sieze up before the fronts. but as long as the piston pushes back in, you should be fine. if you are re-using your rear rotors with new pads i would have the rotors turned first, just to make sure the friction surface is uniform. don’t forget to put lots of grease on your sliders too. especially the rear ones, since you are re-using them rather than replacing them.

other than that, just have patience. it’s a simple enough task, but those bolts can give you quite a headache if they have been on there for a good long while. a torch and some kind of spray lubricant (WD-40) can be your friend as well.

oh, and Bacardi, you are right. Nissin is the OEM caliper brand.

NISSIN does make the OEM calipers. But if you get them new from Honda they’ll be purty and perfect. The rebuilt ones I got must have had the factory finish removed or altered…

I actually did a write up on my Myspace blog about doing calipers, rotors and pads, even bleeding them…if you are a member, you can go to my page and add me as a friend to see it. (Click my username and “go to website”)