Brake carnage!!

[mcmxi]

I've owned and driven cars and trucks for over 40 years, and have done 99% of my own maintenance and repairs on those vehicles. I've driven all over the US, Europe and Australia, East to West, North to South, hundreds of thousands of miles, but I've never broken down, never ran out of fuel, and never needed to be towed. Is that luck? In part, but not mostly.

About a week ago I started to hear and feel a grinding sound from what I thought was the front left brake rotor. I took a quick look at both front rotors (outside only) and they appeared to be pristine. I had installed Brakemotive cross-drilled and slotted rotors along with Brakemotive pads almost 56,000 miles ago. I did that because the front OE rotors were warped when I bought the truck from a friend.

I was going to do a thorough inspection this coming weekend, but on the way back from meeting friends for dinner last night, my luck almost ran out. I came to a stop at a traffic light at the bottom of a hill about 15 miles from home and the grinding up front was bad, and when I stopped it felt like the front left wheel had locked up. Foolishly or not, when the light went green I had to put the foot into it a bit to get going and made it home without further trouble.

This morning I jacked up the front of the truck and spun the front left wheel which turned freely and without any odd grinding noise so my first thought was "well that's weird!". I went to the right front and tried to rotate the wheel and it wouldn't budge. When I pulled off the wheel and removed the caliper I soon saw what the problem was!

In all my years of owning and driving vehicles I've never seen such carnage! The oddest thing is that the inside pads on all four calipers have worn down to next to nothing whereas the outside pads have plenty of material on them. Needless to say, I placed an order for new front and rear rotors and pads, and called NAPA to see if they have Ford F250 calipers in stock since no one has a complete caliper rebuild kit that includes pistons.

The first two photos show the front right caliper and pads, and the third photo shows the difference in outer to inner pad thickness on the front left brake system. The rears are very similar to the front left.

 

[North Idaho Wolfman]

That happens when the calipers don't float properly.
De-icer is the major culprit.
Pull the pins, clean and grease very well!
Helps if you clean up the slide surfaces too.

 

[mcmxi]

That happens when the calipers don't float properly.
De-icer is the major culprit.
Pull the pins, clean and grease very well!
Helps if you clean up the slide surfaces too.

I always clean and grease the caliper pins when replacing pads and rotors but I admit that I don't reapply grease on any kind of schedule. That's going to change based on this experience.

The most surprising thing to me is how quickly it went from all is good to moderate grinding to catastrophic failure. I honestly thought that the grinding was wear indicators or something.

 

[Fordtech86]

Yeah the pins are stuck. I’ve seen much worse, there is still life in those, put em back on

heck you ain’t even started grinding on the pistons, you can still go until you grind them down enough they come out the bores or the rotor is a pizza cutter or it breaks off the hub.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

In Wisconsin I have to pull/clean/lube the pins every 2 years. Last year and the previous were only a few storms, I might get by 4 years at that rate.

 

[Lil Foot]

Had almost exactly the same damage on my wife's old '99 Chrysler LHS.
A plastic grocery bag had gotten stuck on the caliper, and melted into the caliper, gluing the pins in place.

 

[mcmxi]

When I think about the fact that I have a heavy truck and do a lot of towing, almost 60,000 miles on a set of pads and rotors isn't too bad. The only additional cost that's come out of this is the need to repair or replace the right front caliper which is $83 for a rebuilt Ford caliper from NAPA. But I definitely need to up my game when it comes to caliper pin and sliding surface maintenance. This is a learning opportunity for sure.

I've had good experience with Power Stop rotors and pads in the past so ordered a heavy duty "truck and tow" drilled and slotted set for the front and back. The truck should be good to go in a week or so depending on how fast UPS can get the parts to me.

 

[hagrid]

Sliding calipers are the work of Beelzebub.

 

[The Evil Twin]

You could have had a pin binding, pad binding, or both. Uneven pressure will crack a piston. The pad backing plate can get hung up when there is rust between its "ears" and the caliper.
Depending on how much winter driving you do, it might just need to be a annual thing. Or every other oil change. I have never cleaned the pins personally. They get replaced when I need brakes. They are too cheap to bother cleaning.
We don't get a lot of snow here. If we did, I might consider doing calipers at the same time as pads and rotors.

 

[GSD-Keegan]

Living in snow and road salt during the winter months, I used to clean up and regrease pins, bushings and sliding surfaces every spring. Sometimes this still failed me. I always keep the good pads for just in case moments….and a few times they have been put to use when the “other” pad wears out prematurely.

 

[GSD-Keegan]

Haha….

 

[tbk5]

Haha….


View attachment 130076

Is that one of those new highly touted slotted rotors?

 

[DustyRusty]

There was a time when our Ford Explorer lost its front brakes. Ford used a composite rotor and the rotor broke free from the hub. The pads stopped the rotor, but the rotors didn't stop the Ford. I replaced both rotors with new ones from NAPA, and a couple of months later Ford had a recall and they replaced the rotors again.

 

[Runs With Scissors]

Haha….


View attachment 130076

My very first job as a "mechanic" I had a car with this exact same "wear pattern".

The tow guy did not write " CAUTION.......NO BRAKES" on the work order, only "Check Brakes". So I start to pull in in the bay and the pedal goes right to the floor.

The wall of "2 liters" and former 'picture window' stopped me.

I thought for sure, I was gonna get fired, but the owner saw the brakes and chewed out the tow guy.

Apparently the car owner was deaf, and did not realize anything was wrong until the brakes went to the floor.

Crazy world.

 

[GeoHorn]

RWS…I lost a Rolling Toolbox to the new mechanic in the next Bay who did that.

Of course, we NOW know…. the First Thing before taxying is “Brakes-Check”.

 

[mcmxi]

I haven't kept up on the latest and greatest in braking systems, but for decades automotive manufacturers have touted two independent braking hydraulic circuits e.g. front left with back right, and front right with back left. Perhaps some have four independent circuits.

When I drove the truck into the garage to do the inspection, the rear or the truck was a few feet outside the door. I don't have one of those fancy and expansive garages like @North Idaho Wolfman in which one could park a small plane, and I have a large Yamaha outboard in a crate in there so room is even more limited than usual.

After removing the right caliper from the hub and hanging it off the frame with a wire, and realizing that the truck will be out of commission for a week or so, I decided to reinstall the wheel and drive the truck further into the garage so that I could close the garage door.

Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that I had effective brakes, even with the front right caliper sitting in free air. Of course I wasn't moving at 60 mph so "effective" is relative.

 

[mcmxi]

Is that one of those new highly touted slotted rotors?

Oh no ... we're not going to have a debate on the merits or lack thereof of cross-drilled and slotted rotors are we?

 

[mcmxi]

I got the caliper, caliper bracket and rotor off the right front this morning. The caliper guide pins weren't that bad with no sign of corrosion. The grease is a little "dry" but they move relatively easily. The pad guides (anti-rattle) were definitely dry and show some corrosion. Regardless, I'm going to add greasing both to the yearly maintenance schedule.

And for all those YouTube and Internet experts that don't believe anti-seize works, here are the caliper bracket bolts that have been through six Montana winters and 60,000 miles in almost six years. Yep, I'll continue using what has always worked for me.

Here's the outboard and inboard sides of the front left rotor!

 

[RCW]

I got the caliper, caliper bracket and rotor off the right front this morning. The caliper guide pins weren't that bad with no sign of corrosion. The grease is a little "dry" but they move relatively easily. The pad guides (anti-rattle) were definitely dry and show some corrosion. Regardless, I'm going to add greasing both to the yearly maintenance schedule.

View attachment 130094

View attachment 130095

And for all those YouTube and Internet experts that don't believe anti-seize works, here are the caliper bracket bolts that have been through six Montana winters and 60,000 miles in almost six years. Yep, I'll continue using what has always worked for me.

View attachment 130096

Here's the outboard and inboard sides of the front left rotor!

View attachment 130099

View attachment 130100

That’ll turn right out…..good as new…

Just kidding of course….

My last tire rotation brakes looked pretty decent for 55k miles. Rears were a train wreck month ago and replaced all of them as well.

 

[mcmxi]

For anyone in a similar situation, I'm pleased with the remanufactured caliper I picked up today from NAPA. It's a Ford part that they've serviced/rebuilt and not some RockAuto mystery brand. It comes with a caliper bracket, new caliper pins, new dust boots, new anti-rattle clips, new banjo bolt and washer, new seals on the pistons and black paint. All that for a mere $83 is darn reasonable in my book. I gave them the old caliper so no core charge.

I might pick up a rebuilt front left caliper too if the original one looks bad enough. I'll remove it this week and decide after I know what I'm working with. I also picked up a quart of DOT 3 brake fluid, two cans of brake cleaner and some caliper pin grease. The new rotors and pads have shipped and will be here Tuesday.

I'll make a vacuum brake bleeding tool this weekend to help with getting all the old brake fluid out and the brake lines bled. I'll have to see if I can use the Schwaben coolant vacuum fill tool that @The Evil Twin recommended, or the EWK oil extractor pump to help with brake bleeding. I could remove the vacuum pump from the refrigerator that I replaced last week and make something from that if I want a 110V solution rather than using compressed air or a manual pump.