I'm brand new to the forum (guy here at the office showed it to me). I have a 98 F-150 4x4 XLT 5.4L V8. I bought it from a guy here in my office last February. He babied the heck out of it, as have I. It is garage kept day and night. No aftermarket work has been done to the truck, except for Rhino liner, step bars, grill guard, & front torsion bar adjustment to raise front end. The truck hasn't ever seen a repair shop. It has been flawless.

Recently I've been getting a lot of shaking when braking, as well as squeeking when stopping at slow speeds. The truck just turned 50K miles, so I figure it is time to replace pads, turn rotors, etc. Now, I admit I don't know the first thing about doing this myself, but I want to make sure I buy the best parts to take to my mechanic so that when he does the work, the best parts are on it. I've seen that the Motorcraft pads are bad thing.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what work I may need to do and what parts to buy (including the best performing brands, etc.)? Many thanks.

 

Do yourself a huge favor and buy Carbon Metallic pads for the front. The rear takes about 20-25% of the stopping power so semi-metallic will do fine. You can go to Autozone.com and have them shipped to you. I bought new pads front and rear as well as a new hardware kit for the rear. The cool thing about Autozone.com is you can enter your trucks specifics as well as the VIN and get the right part every time. I use it to get the part numbers, then I go to the store and have them pull it without the 8th grade drop-out giving me a GM part.

 

Welcome to the boards White4x4. The shaking problem you're describing usually means that the front rotors are warped. It becomes more pronounced when braking at higher speeds and with increased pedal pressure. depending on how warped they are you might be able to machine cut them straight or if they are too warped you'll have to replace one or both.

There are a bunch of posts on brake pad choices and a search on the topic will turn up enough responses to make your head spin! I'd pay particular attention to those that have actually used the pads in question and speak from experience.

Good luck.

 

I bought the carbon metallic's from autozone (belive they were made by Pinacle) - they work fine, but definatley did not notice any improvements at all... (Although I have a '98 with rear drums)Did notice a considerable increase in brake dust on my wheels though. If I had it to do over, I think I'd buy OEM pads (not the Motorcraft replacement pads.)

 

I can only reccomend the original pads - NOT MOTORCRAFT - Ford pads $120 for the pair, but they work great, no overheating & great stoppping, even with 7kip behind the truck.

I tried Bendix & turning the rotors - never again. Also be VERY careful of the type of grease. I only use Valvoline Synpower. Mobil1 Synthetic broke down & cooked bearings in ~3k miles.

Spend the money, buy new rotors OEM or aftermarket: Just don't have them turned. Search under my id & you'll see my post w/ detailed results in this forum.

Good luck - Hope this helps.

Tony

 

What is wrong with turning your rotors? I can see where this would be a problem if you did it a few times, but can't see where it would be a problem if you did it once or twice. (I've been told from several people that they machine there rotors brand new to make sure they are in spec.)

 

STX,
MY theory is that the manufacturer is trying to squeeze as much weight savings out of every peice of metal to keep the weight down and increase the fuel economy (EPA's CAFE game).

To begin with, the Rotors do not have as much material as they used to: Example, I had rotors on my Pinto turned at least 3 times and no issues. However, on my F150 (granted different chassis & 25 years of evolution), I turned them once and they warped. Found I couldn't turn them again: Not enough material.

After 3k miles, I had to rebuild the brakes again. That's when I bought new rotors (aftermarket OEM) and new FORD pads. As of today, I have 4k miles, no warp, no pull, and LOTS of towing.

I didn't think to measure the new rotors & compare to the old one, just to see if the aftermarket added any material.

Tony