So coming home from a local pizza place, we hear a horrible grinding coming from my truck. I wasn't able to find the root cause until I got home. The brake caliper bracket bolt fell out on the bottom.

This is the 18mm bolt that holds the bracket to the hub. Does anyone know where I can order one online? I checked Advanced Auto and they don't have anything. I need some serious help on this one as the truck is down stuck in the garage until I can find a replacement bolt.

Junk yards is probably going to be my only hope, but with the holidays here I am screwed.

Happy Thanksgiving to me huh.

 

You have to order from the dealer. I checked with a Western Auto, a Napa, and an Advance Auto and none of them carried them. They are about $5/bolt. BTW, mine did the same thing back in October. That's why I have new wheels now, lol. The bottom bolt came out, caliper came up into the rim and split the rim so that it wouldn't hold air. Good luck.

 

They had them at the local dealership. I picked up 2 just in case another decides to fall out. I went back and check them all again though. $5 each. Ouch !!

 

$5 is cheap. They could charge more considering they have the market.

 

Happened to me,too. Lost a rim and a bit of my ego, just after I had installed my lift. Thankfully, I was in a town with a Ford dealer

 

I had one fall out in my 97 Explorer while coming home from Boston on rt 24. What a scare. I ended up finding one in a "pick a part" bone yard. I got one off of a Taurus. When brought the bolt up to the desk to pay the guy ended up giving me the bolt no charge.

 

While I was upgrading my brakes I discovered my caliper bracket was stripped (by who installed my lift) so I had to order a whole new caliper....for $135! Is sucks when things like this go wrong...

 

My top bolt just fell out...drivers side. So it just rubbed against the rim. Scraped it a little bit but nothing major. I called a dealer and he said it was a 14 MM x 37 not 18MM. Right now I have a 3/4 bolt with 3 washers to keep the end from hitting the rotor.

Does anyone know the exact dimension of the bolt? (18 MM x ?)

 

I had the same thing happen to me about five years ago; I had recently changed my front brake pads and when I bolted the calipers back to the mounting brackets, I thought it would be a good idea to use some copper seize on the threads during reassembly: no, the bolt came out while I was driving. I took another caliper bolt to a fastener supply company and they matched up the threads and length with an allen head bolt for me.

 

It is my understanding that the bolt is 14mmx37mm and has an 18mm head. I just ordered a set from a place called Rock Auto.

 

I found this thread late & thought of ordering a fresh set - but could not find them in Rock's catalog.

 

I worked on the same item a few months ago on my 2001 F150 2WD. I was surprised to learn that the official Ford recommended torque was 125-168 ft. lbs. (170-230 Nm). That is tighter than the lug nuts. I needed to use my foot against the torque wrench to get it that tight.
Went back to replace my rotor today and that bolt was just as hard to loosen as it was to tighten.
These stories in this thread make me think the bolts were not tight enough.

 

I just had this happen to me today and when I called the dealership they told me the factory requirement is to use lock tight on the bolts. The dealership said it is very common for 2004 or newer trucks to have this happen if you don't use the lock tight.

 

Exactly what I was going to mention. I had a caliper bolt work its way out after I purchased "Loaded" Calipers, which I double checked the bolt tightness, but did not check for Lock-Tite. Always use Blue Lock-Tite when reassembling my braking system mounting hardware now.

 

I wish I had joined this group sooner. Lost the lower caliper bolt - breaking took out the passenger side aluminum rim on my 2002. Guess what - that rim is obsolete thru ford and no local yard has them. Five bolt custom rims on order as the new standard seems to be six bolt.
Oh as far as getting replacement bolts, the head is 18 mm, but the bolt is a 14 mm X 35 mm X 200 (threads) Found mine at the local ACE hardware store. They had the exact flange bolt in 10.9 which in metric is as good or better than Grade 8 hardened standard bolts. Only kicker is they were $4.00 plus the governors sales tax of course. If anyone is looking for 2002 rims I'll have some for sale soon.