Yea, I have you mixed up with another. Not surprising. I try to answer the PM's if I can and help in the forums. I get confused momentarily, when transitioning from coffee to beer around this part of the day..

 

That transition from coffee to beer can be tricky, for sure; kind of like a diver surfacing. It's good you stay hydrated, though. I try to do the same.

So do Brembo rotors have pads that go particularly well with them? Or does that not matter? I don't want to use pads that produce heavy rotor wear.

I think I'm going to reuse my calipers; clean them up and paint them. They appear to work fine; just rusty.

 

This pic was taken after I gutted all the hardlines, made new ones, then replaced rubber lines. I later replaced the rubber lines with Russel braided lines because I pulled a car hauler quite a bit. Didn't trust the rubbers.
The Brembo's, Cardon built Calipers (steel piston) and Carquest/Raybesto life time pads had two years on them. I cleaned everything up which wasn't that dirty, -no brake dust to speak of. But I went over the rotors with a little Portacable 5" palm sander before re-installing. The truck stopping power can plaster you against the front windshield lol



There's a few good pad suppliers out there. I've never had to pay for good pads on this truck, I had an extra set for the truck I had before this one and I brought those to Carquest woh swapped them out with a new set for this truck. I do that every 3 or 4 years to keep them new and updated. Lifetime Pads, - Carquest/Raybesto is my choice, but there's others that make good pads as well. I'm not sure if Brembo does.

Carquest Blues in the back, -

 

BTW - Even with the Brembos, new calipers and whatnot, the truck still wouldn't brake very well. It wasn't until I changed the rubbers (the lines at the wheels) that the braking was like a night and day difference.

 

Nice looking stuff there. Are those pads ceramic or semi-metallic?

My old brake lines looked like they came off the Titanic. One even had duct tape around it. I haven't cut away the tape yet; I'm curious to see if it was there to contain a leak. I can't imagine it would be strong enough for that. Unless the leak was extremely tiny.

Redoing the drum brakes is in my future too. I'm sure the insides of those things are rotten. I'm not even going to take it apart right now, because I don't have the $$ to fix it yet. And I would not be surprised to find it would not go back together. They work fine; but I would imagine there are parts in there running on borrowed time.

 

Yea, those are Ceramic pads. Quiet, no sound, no dust on the rims. I'm not sure what they cost. That must be good duct tape. Wrinkle free?

I ordered my calipers from Rock Auto. That I remember. When I did the hardlines, I just purchased a roll of 3/16 line from an auto supplier up town and flared, bent up some new lines. That was cheap to do myself, -in case anyone is thinking about doing that. It wasn't bad. What you'll need to do is keep and re-use the existing fittings. New ones are hard to come by.

 

Yeah, I can't believe someone actually duct taped the brake line. Just wow. I should take a picture before I dismantle the tape.

Does Wagner make decent calipers? I see Rock Auto has some loaded thermo-quiet Wagner calipers with semi-metallic pads for about $40 each. Phenolic pistons. I also see some semi-loaded Cardones for $85 apiece; with phenolic pistons, though; no bracket included. That's a big price difference.

I'm contemplating going ahead and replacing the calipers as well, if I can find some for a decent price. These old ones are a real bear to clean up. Someone should have cleaned them up and painted them years ago, before they got this bad.

 

I'd call around in your area to see what you can get calipers for, trading your old ones in on a set. They might be cheaper offering yours up for a core.

 

If they aren't leaking or sticking and the bleeder screws work, don't bother replacing them.

 

You can also rebuild you old ones. I'm not sure why that tape was there. Maybe to keep them quiet? I don't know. If your calipers don't leak, you probably still use them. Unless one of the pistons are seized. I'm not sure what to inform you about Wagner. Just that have been around a long time and I've heard nothing bad.

 

I didn't see your post glc.

 

No. You guys are right. I just finished cleaning stuff up as best I can and painting it. I couldn't get every last kernel of rust out of them; they began this whole thing pretty well encrusted. But I got them to maybe 95% or so. Wire wheel; soaking all night in Naval Jelly; more wire wheel; etc. They don't look too bad; hopefully the paint holds.

The brackets were worse than the calipers themselves; the corrosion on those things was built up like weld beads. I wound up taking an angle grinder to them. The pistons in the calipers seem to work ok. One of the bracket pins was frozen; I got it out with a torch and got some new pins and rubber bushings.

I think I'll just get some nice pads for them. I get sucked into thinking it would be nice to just start from scratch with all new; but you guys are right. This truck is going to need enough other stuff, I need to be smart with my $$.

Got some Brembo rotors on order. Can't wait until they get here so I can put this all back together. Thanks for your guys' help. I may post a final followup to say how it all went.

 

Shoot, forgot to ask something. My front brake disc shields are super rusty; I've read where a number of people remove them and just leave them off. Is this a smart thing to do, or are there possible consequences for doing so? I don't seem to see them anywhere as aftermarket items (or the gasket that goes with them). Mine don't have holes in them yet, but they are so rusty, they are absolutely covered with layers of scale. I wouldn't be surprised if a hole or two pops through when removing that rust. Anybody who isn't already familiar with what parts these are, they are No's 6 and 7 in the diagram JBrew was kind enough to share on page 1.

 

I've always used them or reinstalled them. Yea, they serve a purpose and protect your brake hardware.

 

I think those shields are going to turn out ok. I knocked a lot of rust off them, and nowhere does it appear to go all the way through. A little more elbow grease and some chassis saver will be in their future. The gaskets, though. I'm not so sure about them. When you reinstall the shields, do you always reuse those gaskets, or do you ever use the black Permatex?

Also, I was looking at the spindles. How much wear is acceptable? I really don't want to mess with these unless I have to; but I can feel a ridge in the one spindle where the inner bearing rides; and you can see a slight dip in both spindles where the inner bearings ride. There are also lots of striations I can see but not feel; dark lines basically. Like I said, I don't want this to turn into something where once you start, the whole truck starts to unravel; but I don't either want to put brand new rotors and pads on and either ruin them or wear them out real fast because of something I should have fixed and didn't.