Had my front brakes rebuilt on the RV a month ago after failing inspection. Slides were sticking. Needed ball joints as well, and always had pulsing in the pedal so I opted for new rotors at the same time. Welp, new setup has dragged since I got it back, brought it back and was told to put some miles on it, no issue... This shop has been great to me in the past so, a little questioning but ok, we'll see what happens It went sideways, on a flat straight all of a sudden I had to use enough throttle to maintain 60mph, got a bounce in the front, pulling left until you got on the brakes at which point it pulled right, one hell of a smoke show out of the driver's side wheel well when I pulled off. Let it cool, limped it back home at 30mph, 10gal of gas to go 40miles. Shop can't get back in till next month, I missed this Loudon round as a result, have two more race rounds before my theoretical appointment, so I'm going to tackle this myself this week. I've got a new set of complete calipers and pads from NAPA, new flex lines will be here tomorrow. Given it's a 2006 I'm thinking failing flex lines may be part of my trouble. Anything else I should be doing while I'm in this deep, any tips/tricks/etc I should do when putting the new setup together? Really hoping I didn't fubar that new rotor overheating it.
They had the calipers out of the brackets to clean and lube the slides, don't believe they actually disconnected them so I suspect no bleeding? Looking over the bill, I thought they actually rebuilt the calipers, but I don't see seals or labor for that.
2006 E450. Will I be able to visually see cracking, or do I need to buy a dye? I hadn't thought about cracking, I figured I'd just be creating hard spots.
Had similar issue on my 2004 funmover (E450 chassis). Replaced calipers as they were sticking, had to go back and replace lines even though they looked ok. Lines can be swollen inside and causing calipers to stick. Also check rear brakes, if they aren't up to par it will put a lot more wear on fronts causing premature wear.
Replace the rotor and the brake pads again, along with the wheel bearings. If you got that thing hot enough to blow smoke like that, you don’t want to cheap out.
My guess is the brake lines are collapsing internally making it stick. Put new lines on the front and consider all around. Oh and if you can bleed that thing every year or two. LOTS of fluid in it to suck up water.
I replaced the complete rotor hub assembly, new bearings and calipers on the front of my new to me '05 E450 RV. Sticking caliper at the time, so replaced the whole shabang. You would think this 'reputable' shop would bring you back in to the front of the line to fix your brakes....that's what it when in for to begin with right? oh oh, almost forgot....The napa 'OEM' replacement pads i bought did not fit the rotors. They were the correct shape for the calipers, but had like 5mm of extra pad material on each pad, and would not fit on the rotor. I took them back and bought Wagner pads that fit perfect. https://www.napaonline.com/en/p/NB_4886529?impressionRank=2 https://www.napaonline.com/en/p/BRGBR50?impressionRank=1 https://www.napaonline.com/en/p/BRGBR15101?impressionRank=3
I was going to suggest checking the wheel bearings too, but others already mentioned it ... If it was hot enough for a 'smoke show' the bearings are probably burned up too.
Like others said, that hot, I'd replace pads, rotors and bearings minimum. Inspect everything else. If the slides aren't sticking and the line aren't closing in on themselves, make sure and bleed fluid to proper level in master reservoir. If they just c-clamped the pistons back in without bleeding, the master reservoir could be too full. This isn't usually a problem, but I've seen on a couple "cars" over the years this to cause the pistons not to retract enough. Also, if they replaced calipers, don't assume they routed the lines back properly. Once on my 97 Chevy 1500, I routed the rubber brake line back incorrectly after having it off for a brake job. I made it 5 miles before it was pulling massive to one side. I don't think you have kinked lines, you could have swelling lines like others have stated. Point is, check everything when you're done with a fine tooth comb. Make sure it functions properly on the jack stands with the tires off. Could be bad calipers. They probably bought cheap rebuilt. It's pretty much the same as car or motorbike brakes. If it's got abs, some of those can be a pain to bleed, but that shouldn't make it lock down, just know that when you bleed.
It's the flex lines, had several of those issues in the family over the last 50 years, vans and cars.
I officially hate the clips and where they're placed for retaining the flex lines at the frame... What an unnecessary PITA Ford! Flex lines replaced, calipers replaced, couldn't budge the bracket bolts with my pneumatic impact or biggest socket wrench, don't have a breaker bar... yet. The shop didn't rebuild the calipers, they just put new slides on, and new glide plates in the brackets. Looking at the crud around the pistons I think they just pushed them back for the new pads, no signs that the brake lines were ever removed. No signs of cracking/stress to the rotors. It does look like the caliper that smoked has something delaminating from the inside of the phenolic pistons? What's pissing me off, I have drag with the new calipers after bleeding. I never had this setup up in the air prior to the shop working on it so I don't know what 'normal' drag is, but I have to put effort into spinning the bare hubs, they won't rotate from momentum after. I tested cracking the bleeder to see if there was pressure without the brake pedal in play, nada, and no change in drag. The drag seems to be the same between the old brakes and new. I also tried pulling the ABS fuse as I have one friend says his rig locks up if he doesn't, no change in drag.
Bought a big ass breaker bar, got the brake 'anchors' off and swapped them as well, so now fully new front caliper setups. Pads and calipers have slightly more float in the new brackets, no change in drag but I'm not going to panic unless they cook on the test drive. In the mean time, I think I pulled every muscle in my left arm undoing and torquing those caliper bracket bolts.
When you say the bare hub won't rotate after installation, are you just rotating the rotor without tire, or with tire mounted and spinning tire? Without tire, spinning rotor with new pads and "new" rotor setup, the clearance is tight. Drag is normal to an extent. Rotating just the hub/rotor will not free spin due to drag. Put tire on and try to rotate, there will still be drag and the tire won't just spin like a motorcycle front wheel, but it'll spin a little better. Did you check your hub bearings? You need to check them and regressed them at the least. Did the shop have the rotor/hub off? How do you know they didn't half ass that? I think you caliper setup is okay as long as it's minor drag. That's normal especially with all new tight tolerances. But recheck everything else, like bearings if you haven't. Don't skimp or it'll bite you later.
Hubs were off and replaced, needed ball joints so had them do rotors and pads at the same time. I don't know where they got the hub/rotors from so I don't know if they reused bearings and seals or not. On the drag front, the benchmark I found was you should be able to rotate the mounted wheel with one hand, which I can do.
