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with "NitroMax"Brake
Caliper Overhaul
Page 1
If - like me - you do a lot
of Offroading you know how important it is to maintain your vehicle every
time you've been in the mud. You also know how hard it sometimes is to find
the time or - after a long day of concentrated driving - find the
spirit to get up off that couch and start cleaning your Zook.
Well, rest assured: some day
your Zook will let you know you should have done something a long time ago !
I had mine pulling hard to
the left while driving and pulling hard right under braking, so I knew there
was something wrong with the brakes. As if I didn't realize that: there was
a lot of smoke coming from the left fender well and when I stopped and
touched the centre of the wheel I almost burnt my hand....................yes,
time to ride back slowly to the garage and get too it!
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When you pull the wheel and you've been
neglecting your cleaning like me, you'll probably find something along
the lines of the picture, alot of mud on parts that are meant to slide.
Not
good !
Take a wire brush and clean off all the
dirt, taking care not to damage the brake line or the rubber caliper
guide pin caps on the bolts!
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Put a clamp on the
brake line, preventing the brake fluid from spilling all over your
work floor ( you'll loose some fluid anyway so have some tissues
or rags ready ) and loosen the Banjo-bolt that holds the brake line to
the caliper. Don't take it off yet, just loosen it half a turn.
Unbolt both M6 bolts that hold the caliper and lift it. Might take
some prying with a screwdriver. Try to hold the caliper with the hole
in de back upward, so you won't spill all the brake fluid from the
caliper on your clothes. Empty it in a separate can which you deliver
at the chemical waste station.
Once the caliper is off, turn it a little and undo the
Banjo-bolt.
The brake pads stay in the caliper body
when you lift it out. Slide them out and check them for wear.
There's a deep grove right through the middle....................well
at least there should be. When it's not there anymore or just slightly
visible it might be the right time to put new brake pads in.
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This is what you see
when the brake pads are out. There are little Stainless Steel clips
that hold the brake pads in the caliper. In this picture you can see
there's quite some dirt in and behind the clips.
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They are easily removed
with the tip of a small screwdriver, just don't put any force on them
for they might bend or worse:
fly out and hit you in the eye.
There are two clips
on each side. Take them out and clean them with the wire brush. Then
also clean the notch where they sit. Looking at
the clip you can see there's only one way they can be put back in.
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These
are the bolts you've removed to get the caliper off. Clean them
thoroughly and put them aside in a clean rag. Use a compressor gun to
blow out the Banjo-bolt. Replace the rings for the Banjo-bolt
every time you take the bolt out, you don't want your brake lines to
leak because you were too cheap to save money on these rings. Do not
use just any ring, these are made from a special metal just for this
application.
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In this pic you see the
rear of the caliper, where the Banjo-bolt goes, clean it with the tip
of the screwdriver or a small wire brush. For once you don't have to
worry about dirt falling in, you're taking the brake piston out anyway,
so you can blow out any mud that has fallen in. |
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Here is the
caliper on the (clean) workbench. I've taken out the caliper pins
and the rubber bush dust boot taking care not to
lose the small metal rings that sit on one side of the bush dust boots. Clean the rubber
boot with brake cleaner and polish the
caliper pins with a Brillo pad. Once they are clean check them
for wear or damage and put them aside in a clean rag.
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Time to tap the piston
out using a punch. Don't
use one with a pointy end but one with a rather large surface, so not
to damage the rear of the piston.
Put the caliper in a vice, with the Banjo-bolt hole up. (do not over
tighten the vice, it just needs to hold the caliper. When
over tightened it might break the casing of the caliper).
Gently tap it, do not use force by
big blows with a large hammer. It will come out eventually ;-)
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As you can imagine from
this picture, the piston did not come out easy on this caliper. It's also
obvious why the brake got stuck :-O Oh well, good to see I'm not doing
all this work for nothing.
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