I have a 2004 F250 CC V10, owned the vehicle for about 2 years now. When I bought the truck I replaced all the calipers, rotors, and pads for all four wheels since I have three kids and just did not want to chance being able to stop the truck.

I used Napa eclipse calipers, wagner pads, and honestly I don't remember the manufacturer of the rotors, but I did not go cheap on any of the brake parts.

Two years later, the right rear pads are almost gone, the right rear rotor is too thin to turn, and when you apply the brakes fairly hard, the truck dives to the left -- signifying a problem with the right front braking. The pads on the right front look good, no uneven wear and are about the same thickness as the left front.

Calipers pins slide freely -- this was confirmed by my mechanic that I've trusted for 20 years. We bled the brake lines as well and seem to have very good flow of brake fluid on the right side. We bled the left side as well just to test and compare.

The left side pads and rotors (front and back) look good. We did not pull the left rotors to measure the thickness, but there is a good amount of meat on the pads.

In the past 2 years I have put 16,000 miles on the truck. 80% of my driving is in the city and I have only hauled two heavy loads (16' enclosed trailer toy hauler) about 50 miles one way.

I've never seen an issue with an entire side (this case the right side) have a braking issue. Not sure if replacing brake lines is the next step or not, but this is why the forum is here to ask for advice!

 

New doesn't mean good...more so then ever today. This is why I like to use a 20" set of channel lock pliers to compress the caliper piston. I can feel a bad caliper. Pull each and compress see if they move freely. Another test is to have the truck in the air and apply the brakes. Then try to immediately rotate each tire after lifting off the brake pedal(two person job). This will eliminate the good from bad. Could have a bad soft line too. Cheap enough to replace, PITA but cheap. A "brake pull" can indicate either a seized caliper on one side (seized down on the rotor)or one seized on the opposite side that wont that wont release or apply down onto the rotor. You should see signs of over heating and smell brake too? You said the sliders slide freely. Recheck the sliders to be sure while its apart. Frozen sliders is usually the number one culprit for burnt up rear disc brakes on these rigs...you do have discs on the rear if I read the post right. Not sure when Henry switched from drums.

 

Your problem could also be in the rear, but at its age the first thing I would do after replacing RR pads and rotor is replace at least both front brake hoses, and probably the rear hoses as well. The right rear was probably dragging, not enough to notice but enough to wear out the pads and rotor and now could be seized and not applying at all, causing it to pull left.

 

Just a quick update on this. I have changed the RR rotor, caliper, and pads and still have the problem with the truck pulling to the left -- in 2WD. The reason why I added 2WD, is that we had a little snow overnight and this morning I put the truck in 4WD and decided to test the braking issue and the truck pulled to the right. So I thought maybe an uneven road -- nope -- 5 separate times in 2WD we went left and 5 separate times in 4WD we went right.

Front hubs were replaced with Warns (summer of 2014) and I know the hubs were in the lock position. I've checked the tire pressure which is at 65 psi on 1 year old Copper Discovery AT3 tires.

Now, I'm no expert mechanic but I know enough about how to change the spark plugs in this V10 beast, replace the front wheel hub bearing assembly, I've even done the broken exhaust stud fix by replacing the stock manifolds with Gibson headers --> SPD Y pipe --> Gibson muffler.

I would really appreciate someone to help me understand the left pull in 2WD vs. a right pull in 4WD when applying the brakes.

 

Time to inspect the front end to include the brake, steering and 4WD systems, including chassis components.

The front outer Ujoints will cause all sorts of unwanted steering and braking problems if their seized up. You really cant tell (sometimes) if their seized unless you actually pull the shafts and "feel" the Ujoints. If you're in that deep might as well replace them with Spicers.

Worn BJs, steering linkages and track bar bushings will cause this too (the pulling to both sides).

Start simple by examining the rotors, is ether burnt? Are the pads floating in the calipers as they should? If all this looks good start focusing on steering linkages and chassis components.

Have a second person rock the steering wheel back n forth with the engine running, truck on the ground, park brake applied, while you observe the linkages for unwanted play.

How many miles on this truck? Have you ever serviced anything on the front end beyond what you've already mentioned?

 

You may be dealing with two separate problems. Without some more information, we can't know for sure if the brake problem is related to the pulling problem. An infrared temp gun, available cheaply online or at (I think) HD/Lowes/Harbor Freight will tell you right away if you have a brake problem on one wheel because the temperature of the rotor surface and other brake parts will be considerably higher. They're less than $20 and a fun toy to have around.

When you originally replaced the pads and rotors 2 years ago, did the wear look uneven? Do you think that this is a problem that was introduced when you did that work?

It's possible that a metal burr or some other manufacturing defect has compromised your brake system. I've never seen it but I've heard of it happening. Sometimes something gets stuck in a junction or ABS pump and you're stuck with isolating that area and replacing the part with the blockage. The fact that it's only happening to one wheel suggests that it's local to that wheel or piece of line between the junction on the rear axle and the wheel, so that's good news at least.

Regardless, I would take care of the brake problem first and then see if the pull goes away. If it still pulls, then start looking at the suspension components above. On a 10+ year old truck, a lot can get worn out.