2 weeks ago I had my tires ballanced and rotated, the shop I had it done at told me that my brakes would need to be replaced soon, they said the rear ones look new but the front ones are really thin, they told me I would need new rotors and callipers, I'm going to have them checked out at a more reputable shop to see if its true about the calipers, there has been no metal to metal contact, I still have some break pad life left but the rotors are thin, they have been turned a few times and you can see heat spots in them.

My question is, if I do accually need new calipers along with the rotors is there anything else I would need to replace, I am planning on doing the job myself, also would I need new cables of any kind or to bleed the brakes, also what is involved in bleeding the breaks.

question two, I am a little broke, as always, and wont have the money to buy everything all at once, if I do need new calipers along with the rotors would it be ok to first replace the rotors and brake pads and hold off on the calipers until I had enough, Or should I just waite until I have all the parts and do it at once?

thanks for all the help

 

The probably meant new pads instead of calipers. Pads wear out, rotors can warp or vary in thickness, but calipers are pretty solid. If you do replace everything, it's pretty straight forward. Would be a great time to flush the brake fluid. Be sure to understand what needs replaced first, then decide, or post here, what order things need done in.

First question, how old is your truck and how many miles? I'm interested in the discrepancy between the front and back. The front brakes carry a disproportionate braking load. This changes with a lot of things. Trucks and vans used to have a proportioning valve that varied the percent of rear wheel braking with the load. They stopped doing that by the time my truck came out, they were a pain. My '97 just applies a constant percentage to the rear and lets the RABS handle any problems.

All told, if you carry heavy cargo, the front will wear faster than normal (no ride height proportioning valve). If you brake really hard, the front will wear faster than normal (the harder you brake, the more the inertial shift to the front). But the metering function in the master cylinder may be off.

Good luck.

 

Every brake shop wants to change everything. Thats how they send their kids to Harvard.

Disc Brakes are one of the easiest do it yourself repairs there is. The first way to bleed your brakes is to have one person sit in the drivers seat and pump the brake pedal and hold it down. While another under the truck opens the valve (3/8 wrench) to release the pressure. Close the valve, pump up the brakes again, hold it, open valve and repeat until brake pedal is firm. Make sure to keep your brake fluid filled while doing this. There are other ways to do it by yourself, but like cantrma said, I dought you need calipers. I also dought you need rotors either unless you can feel them wobble when you brake. Just buy yourself a Haynes or Chilton manual and a set of pads (get the good higher priced ones) at AutoZone or wherever and reshoe that thing. There may be like a $5 core charge on the pads.

BRAKES!?!?!...WE DON'T NEED NO STINKIN' BRAKES!!!!

 

my truck is a 99 f150 4x4 5.4lv8 with about 113500 miles on it, I'm pretty sure the rotors do need replaced, I have had them turned twices since I got the truck and the last time I had them turned was at a shop where I knew the guys personally and they wouldn't jerk me around and they told me they where getting pretty thin and if I had the money it would be better to buy rotors but if not they would turn them for me but I probably wouldn't want to have that done again, it is starting to shake when I break again and you can see the heat spots on the rotors, as far as the calipers go I think I will have my breaks inspected by a more reputable shop, the only reason I was at this other shop was because it was the only american car care center and in Idaho where I used to live thats where I bought my rims and tires so I had free tire ballance and rotation nationwide and my truck was wobbling really bad between 40-50 mph.

 

The only reason the calipers would need to be replaced is if they leaked bad enough to the point that they can't be reworked. I had my rotors on my 97 F-150 turned last year along with new pads and new lower ball joints. I would say yes to replacing the rotors if you have had them turned a couple times. But your calipers won't need to be replaced.

 

Well then don't replace them with stock. Check Ebay for some drilled and sloted aftermarket ones. They will bleed off heat much better and won't need to be turned every time the pads need changing. Theres even a niffty pad made with a slot in the middle, also for cooling purposes.

 

Thanks for the info, I was planning on getting some drilled and slotted rotors, I have seen some on ebay for 99 bucks so next check I will get them and I will try and find some of those break pads with the slot in the middle, thanks for all the help

 

Drilled and slotted rotors do not dissipate heat better. The holes and slots are there to allow gases that some type pads emit under hard braking conditions to escape. They have become popular for the street because they look cool. Most pads that you run on street vehicles don't emit these gases.

Have a great day,
Doc

 

Yes they do, simple physics would tell you that.

 

The reason for drilled and/or slotted rotors is to let the gas generated by the pads escape. I can see some advantage in cooling, but the pimary purpose is gas release.

 

Drilled and slotted rotors do help dissipate heat, and heat is what causes rotors to get warped, drilled and slotted rotors last a lot longer then standard rotors

 

There are two aspects of cooling brakes, their ability to absorb heat during braking and their ability to dissipate that heat after braking. If you drilled or slotted existing rotors they would have less mass to absorb heat during braking. Admittedly, you could easily just buy a rotor with the same mass after being drilled. I can see an advantage for drilling to allow more surface area for air to dissipate heat after braking.

That being said, I don't see any advantage for slotted rotors in heat dissipation. Drilling is almost exclusively the domain of the tuners and their 'bling' these days. Racing has gone almost (or entirely) away from drilling to slotted rotors today. If the issue were cooling, why wouldn't they be drilling.

And metallic and ceramic pads don't offgas nearly as much as the organic pads that only daily drivers use today. Here are two links, the first scholarly but without creditials listed, the second of lesser quality, that may help. I believe that looks are what drive drilled rotor sales today and that companies advertise advantages that don't or barely exist to help sell them. But I'm done now.

http://www.gti-vr6.net/library/wheel...ed_rotors.html
http://www.tirerack.com/brakes/brake...oStop+II+Rotor