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Not every vendor who offers a Cryo treated rotor Starts with the same blank rotor, Rather then just saying “Cryo” it would be helpful to include the brand or even part number of the rotor you had cryo’ed. That way people don’t just assume ever rotor that has been Cryo treated is awesome because the market place is full of junk including Cryo rotors.
Our 2wd Ex has 132k and the pads aren't going to last much longer so I've been reading threads like this one.
The brake system is all original and works fine.
I'm looking at replacing the pads, rotors and hoses.
When bleeding the brakes I've usually used DOT 4 Wagner brake fluid.
I went to buy a couple of bottles of fluid and saw Wagner DOT 5.1 on the shelf.
The Wagner DOT 5.1 brake fluid is glycol-based, good to 500 deg and can be mixed with DOT 3/DOT 4 fluids.
Any comments on using the Wagner 5.1 fluid?
I put all new calipers, rotors, pads, and brake lines( brake lines were done by a shop) less than a year and half ago. I only use the X to tow about 6000 miles a year, towing 6-8k lbs, usually closer to 6k. So i opted for Oreillys rotors, calipers, and "brakebest' garbage pads. The calipers were reman'd FORD. The enclosed trailer has electric brakes so i figured with the low tow weight, the amount of towing/driving i do with the X, i could get by with Oreilly parts.
The brakes begain to feel progressively 'wooden' without towing. Good pedal, but no stopping power.
So, i ordered some HAWK LTS front/rear pads, and i found a new Powerstop Z23 slotted rotors/pads kit locally on CL. These retail for around $350, got the the kit for $160.
While installing the new parts, i had a leaking seal on a caliper. Lifetime warranty, so took it back. Had a caliper bracket with a seized slide pin....had another new bracket and hdware so replaced it. Moving on, went to compress the caliper pistons back in another caliper and blew a seal....took it back under warranty.
So I have 2 new calipers w/brackets (4 calipers within 18 mos), 4 new POWERSTOP slotted rotors, HAWK LTS pads front/rear, and a complete fluid flash with Valvoline Synthetic DOT 4.....and my brakes are amazing. It stops better than my Honda pilot with Powerstop brakes all around it.
I'm a bit leery of using the Oreilly reman'd FORD calipers, but with lifetime warranty, it's hard not to. Maybe i'll have better luck with these.
I will only use cryo treated rotors on the front of the Ex, with Hawk LTS pads.
Back in 2005 when I was researching brakes because of the shimmy/pulse I couldn't eliminated (see the tech folder regarding cementite/black spotting), I learned about cryo treated rotors. With cryo treated rotors, I never had the shimy come back, but when I tried non-cryo'd rotors a couple years back (on a whim), the shimmy/pulse came back.
For the rear brakes, I use Centric OEM replacement rotors with any quality brake pad, like Wagner.
Stewart
The cryo treated rotors with hawk pads I put on lasted the longest so far.
This has been a great thread to read, lots of knowledge here. Hoping to start a conversation here to enlighten some more...
Issue we have been having with '01 excursion 7.3L... Up here in NY we park it for the winter. The last 2 years in a row we have had to replace calipers all the way around because they stay slightly engaged during use, heating up the rotors. After new hoses, calipers, and rotors it will work fine all year until its paked for several months and we get it out again in the spring.
I'm wondering if we are getting junk calipers from Ford? Would the best option be to get new calipers from Raybestos, flush the brake fluid and hope for the best? Or should we rebuild the calipers, flush and hope for the best?
When the calipers are replaced, the slide pins are removed, cleaned and greased. Last time we noticed no binding when moving the caliper by hand without the rotor installed.
I havent seen new front from raybestos either. Im on the same page with moisture, thinking we should do another full bleed including the abs pump. Whaddyathink?
If your slide pins are not hanging, then next two possibilities are going to be the pistons in the calipers or the pads in the brackets. With the early design I’ve had to hammer pads out of the brackets due to the pad steelback tabs rust and lock in the bracket. So you need to figure that out for one.
if it’s not the pads rusting in place and the pistons are hard to move, then it’s typically rust. I’ve got other posting at this site and no intention of reinventing the wheel.
Reman’ed calipers all have the same issue, they rusted in the past typically with pits in the sealing grooves. New boots cannot seal well against that, and it’s why I bought several vehicle sets of calipers for my ‘03 when you could still buy new from Ford. Not rebuilt, NEW.
With used calipers the only thing you can do is use RTV to try to seal the boot to the caliper body after the seal and piston are installed. Some others have assembled the calipers using silicone caliper grease to so the same in a non hardening way. Take your choice.
Flushing the brake fluid is not going to do anything about rust outside the whetted area.
12-21-2018, 09:16 PM
