Hey guys, okay, first off, newbie here obviously and I apologize for the presumtive screen name (I was trying to be cool in front of my dad!) Okay, a little background, I'm a GTO guy that's been working on cars since the early 80's. Dad's 2010 Grand Caravan has had a rough, pulsing brake pedal lately so I told him to bring it over. I pulled it all apart, noticed the crap back brakes so we picked up new pads and rotors. I found out about these screw in caliper cups the hard way but I didn't reef too hard on the C clamp before I researched it and found this site. So, I went, bought the tool and screwed the cups in. Put it all together and thought I was finished. He pumped the pedal out to seat the calipers and all seemed well until we started it up and the pedal sinks to the floor. Exhaustive research as well as dealer service managers telling us to bleed the brakes, there's air in the lines. I say BS on that because we never opened any lines. So, I waste my time bleeding them anyways and no air comes out. Then we start pumping the parking brake because I saw somewhere on line it needs to be readjusted and I was hearing a click when we engaged it. It wasn't working but it was free moving. So after awhile I noticed how far the caliper cup was retracting away from the pads after we released the brake pedal. A good 3/16" gap. So I get the idea to take it all back apart, and unscrew the piston so it's tighter to the pads. Magically, the pedal stopped sinking to the floor and everything's fine now, including the parking brake. Now, on to my question after this long winded preface: Did I damage the "self adjusters" inside these calipers when I first tried compressing them? I don't understand how it's supposed to work if it's not just pumping the brake pedal. I'm just worried that though the brakes are fine right now because of me manually adjusting that cup out, that they'll fall out of adjustment as the brakes wear if they're no longer self-adjusting correctly. Can anyone explain the "self adjusting" thing to me as far as the cup rotating itself out of the housing?

Thanks!
Dennis

 

NO. Probably fine. You DO not need to push in the calipers all the way into the caliper. You screw up the rear parking break adjustment if you do that. So by you uncrewing it you fixed it. you need to just screw it into the caliper enought to have the new pads fit in. this ways the parking brake has enough adjustment to work. But i also learned this from here reading other people doing the same when replacing the rear brakes. oh make sure the sliders of the pads underneath are really clean. \

 

okay, thanks for the reply! Slider clips are brand new, they came with the new pads. I'm still curious how they're supposed to self-adjust though. the cups don't rotate when the pedal goes. I watched it without being on the rotor where he stepped on the pedal and it flexed out and then retracted in without anything to squeeze it back in and it was a noticeable movement both directions. If that would have been a conventional caliper, that cup would have spit out of the caliper housing and given me a bath of oil. Scared the heck out of me when he did it by accident getting into the truck while I was messing around with trying to compress it before finding out about the screw thing. Oh, and that $12 universal took I bought at Advance auto was near useless. The only way I got it to work was by filing the closest set of tangs to get a feeble bite on the caliper cup. It won't matter down the road, I'm guessing he'll buy a new caravan before these brakes ever go again and I'm sure next year's model will require some kind of Audio Sonic compressor with a laser guide or some other crazy crap. It's a damn caliper, technology has been fine since the 60's on them, don't mess with it!

 

well i think when u hit the hand brake it turns out a bit. when u hit the brakes themselfs they act like normal calipers push out. either or not sure which one but that my understanding for the rear brakkes.

 

Just cycle the parking brake to tighten up the piston to the pads. Honestly, I never understood why people work on brakes when they do not understand how they work. I'm not trying to be critical, but far too often people blame the car or the parts when they just do not understand how things work. Digging in and forcing things to cooperate is a recipe for disaster.

Besides, you should NEVER force the old brake fluid back through the system. Always open the bleeder and let out the crap built up inside the caliper. To each their own, but I have seen a fair amount of people ruining master cylinders without doing it properly.

As for complaining about the tool, buy the right tool, not a universal piece of crap from an auto parts store.

Old style calipers no longer exist on the market because they were weak at best. Newer design parts are far better at clamping and performance.

 

Wow, where do I start here? Okay, you're right, I don't know what I was thinking attempting to do brakes myself with only 30 years of experience doing automotive repairs, restoring cars frame off, building motors, etc -- yep, changing brake pads and rotors was way above my head. From the 60's to 70's, to 80's to 90's cars I've worked on, I never encountered any real variance on brake design therefore what was I thinking when I expected that to continue? I must have missed the memo from Chrysler when they decided to turn the industry on end with this new design. I also worked at an auto parts store back in the 80's and sat through too many seminars on brake servicing through the Bendix reps and never once was anything mentioned about your idea of opening bleeders during a caliper compression. You were to open the master cylinder cover to allow the fluid to return through the lines as you slowly clamped the cup back in. Not eggagerating when I say I've done well over 100 brake jobs in my lifetime, and sorry, but I've never done any damage to the master cylinder by following this method and nor have I ever come across anyone who opens their bleeder screws to compress calipers. (well, now I have)

As far as bitching about the tool, that's simple. I asked for the tool to compress the calipers, they sold it to me. I get it home and it doesn't fit. I modified it so it would fit. I didn't ask for a tool that wouldn't work, I asked for the tool to compress the caliper. He gave me the option of renting one with a deposit or I could buy one for $12. No mention of the fact it wouldn't fit on the caliper. So I should have bought the tool from a grocery store? where else would I find the tool other than an auto parts store? You're rant really makes no sense to me.

Thanks for the tip on cycling the parking brake. If you read my original post, I stated that we did do that and it seemed to have no effect on tightening the brake and bringing the pedal up after we did it for 10 minutes. So, along this line, what happens to the brake system if you don't use the parking brake? As the pads wear, the pedal will sink further and further to the floor because the parking brake isn't being cycled? I find that hard to believe. As I worked on this issue, my dad called the service manager at the dealer (is he more qualified than me? I'd think yes at this point in reference to working on a 2010 caravan) His response was I had air in my lines. We explained what we did and that we didn't open the lines. He still insisted that by compressing the calipers, it sucked air back in the line. That was completely false. I bled them anyways and not a single bubble burped out. The pedal went to the floor because of the gap between the caliper and the pad. So much for qualified personnel tackling the issue over someone who has no business attempting brakes because he didn't understand them.

Finally, as to your final statement that old style calipers were weak at best is supposed to mean what? Fluid is pressed into the caliper housing forcing the cup out against the pads/rotor. I see a brake hose conducting fluid to this caliper just as it does on every other caliper I've seen for 30 years. What makes this one different is the parking brake cable rotating the caliper cup. If you want to rephrase the statement that parking brake technology is advanced, then I'd agree to that since the other rear disc parking brakes I'm familiar with where they use drum shoes inside the rotor body just became a rusted mess. What about the front calipers then? No parking brake cables so no adjustment. Does that mean that the front calipers are "old design" or am I missing something there?

I don't know why I let this get to me but I let it slip through today and now I'm out 30 minutes of my life that I could have been outside welding that patch panel on my 67.

No hard feelings; I asked for responses/opinions and I got one.

Later,
Dennis

 

You beat me to it, awesome reply

 

Don't jinx it now... VW/Audi and few other European cars uses Electric parking brake motor mounted on it's caliper, and you need Scanner to reposition parking brake motor before you can retract parking brake. The Purpose is for Hill Stop Assist.
Mercedez Benz has some cars with Brake-By-Wire for few year like Air-Craft
And with more an more Hybrid vehicle hits the road, you will see eletro-magetic braking on more and more cars.

And Volvo is testing cars that auto-matically follows the car in front of you, and they have some eletronic braking that can stop from 60-0mph. Who knows how exactly does their braking system works.
And yes, they are ultra-sonic guided and also have infared Camera in front of the bumper.

 

wow, they never stop with "progress" do they? I'm sure these cars will be around 15 years from now and functioning trouble free too! I want to see testing results for aged, dirty cars in 35 degree winter days with a sleet storm going and not have environmental issues affecting all this crap. I battle with the stupid new radio in my truck because the volume **** doesn't seem to affect the actual volume coming through my speakers with the new rheostat-less control **** that's magnetic and doesn't work right when it's cold out or now, doesn't work at ALL anymore! I'm about to turn into one of those old guys that shakes his cane at the young whipper-snappers bitching about how things suck now compared to the good ole days.....guess what? those old guys were RIGHT!

 

You are correct
The only way to get a good feeling or any brake pedal is to screw the piston back out and leave the smallest possible gap between the piston and the new brake pad
Also the same on dodge Journey !!!