97 Explorer 4x4 wife is reporting occaisional grinding noises from front end, worsening when braking. Pads and rotors reasonably new (less than 10K miles) and look to be wearing even....reading the forum I have seen issues reported with sticking calipers....can anyone describe the noise that might occur when this happens? Of course, when I go to drive it, it sounds fine.

Appreciate the help.

Jeff

 

The noise your reporting is usual when the pad is gone and the metal is exposed in the back of the pad possibly...had a problem with my piston sticking..pulled my X slightly to the right...(was the front passenger side outer pad)...If in your case this has happened ..you should notice alot of brake dust on the rim...moreso than on any other rim...that was my first tip off...and then a few days later the grinding that ruined my rotor face...i had just put on new pads...had to buy a whole new set of bendix titaniums for 1 pad...get it checked out ASAP...save some money...

 

Make sure the caliper slide pins aren't binding up.

 

I read about the slide pins...I am not a huge brakes guy. Can I lube these without taking the assembly apart?


Thanks

Jeff

 

Yes, pull the wheel and tap each slide pin out, lube it and put it back in. Do them 1 pin at a time. Make sure you don't put them in upside down.

 

Thank you for the gudiance. Here is an exploded diagram from my manual of the caliper assembly
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=2AYsWrZw4asXJw
I assume I am tapping out the "caliper pins" shown here, lubing them up, and sticking them back in...is that correct? Do I just generously lube the entire pin? Are they retained, or will they simply tap out? Thank you for your guidance.

Jeff

 

They will 'tap' out. I usually use a hammer and a flat punch. You don't have to 'wail' on them, just tap them. There are no retainers.

 

OK, predictably, my calipers don't look like the ones shown in my Haynes. I can't identify any slides. They look like they have bolts on the sides that are booted (see my image), and I can tell the boot has split on one of them and the grease inside is pretty violated.
The bolt has a head towards the inside of the car, but I don't want to pull it without seeking further advice from the forum.
Lastly, I assume that if the boot is split, I am probably going to need to replace the caliper.
Advice sincerley appreciated.

Here's a pic.
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=2AYsWrZw4asXNg

 

What you are pointing to in your picture is more or less a compression boot. it does not attach to anything, the bellows provide pressure toward the caliper. It does look like you have some rust issues going on there (pretty normal, don't panic). I would go ahead and pull the caliper, There are two bolts that attach the caliper to the spindle, one above the half shaft (4X4), and below and a little to the rear. once these are pulled, insert a stiff screwdriver into the top of the caliper and into the cooling fins on the rotor and gently but firmly apply a little pressure slowly to push the piston back into the caliper (a couple of millimeters is all that is needed). Pull caliper off rotor and and remove pads. The C frame will the pull out from the caliper slide pins. there will also be two long metal clips that the c frame slides on that will need to be cleaned and greased along with the slide pins. Make sure you get some high temp grease that is specificly for brake parts as your calipers and rotors will get hot enough to glow sometimes.

Hope this help you. I just replaced all the pads on my wifes 97 mountianeer, along with cleaning the pins and slides, the job took me about 1-1/2 hours in my driveway with manual tools.