Last weekend, my wife complained about something "dragging" when she'd apply the brakes on our 2006 Chevy Tahoe. Sure enough, the right rear brake was making that all too familiar tell tale grinding sound that it was time to "do the brakes". Lovely.
Quick call to the chain service center we go to for oil changes would have us out the door for $378. Just for the rears. No doubt the fronts would have to go too seeing these are the original brakes on the old beast that has now just shy of 100K on her. So, all in, we're looking around $750 give or take.
Having replaced the rotors and pads on my 2002 Monte Carlo, all the pads not to mention rebuilding the rear brake system on my 1977 Corvette not to mention doing similar rear brake work on my 1996 rear drum brake equipped Camaro in the last year I wasn't intimidated by the project. I picked up everything I needed at Autozone for $242. That included a can of brake cleaner, brake fluid and packet of bolt grease. Such the deal.
Replacing pads and rotors on full size SUV's is not complicated work but it is physically demanding. Just getting the lug nuts loose was a bear wrestle; I swear the darn things were tightened down to 100 foot pounds if not more. Then there's the exercise of jacking the thing up with the bottle jack the Tahoe comes with, my little trolley jack wasn't big enough to get the Tahoe in the air, and then I put jack stands underneath on the main frame rails.
Again, this is straight forward work. For the rear, remove the two 12mm bolts holding the caliper on and it comes off with a tug or two. The front calipers use a T-55 Torx bolt or star bit. Why they're different is beyond me. Pry the pads out with a screw driver and then remove the caliper bracket by removing its two 18mm bolts. Pull the retainers off the lugs, if they're still on there, and the rotors comes off...well. If only life was that simple.
Save for a slight wiggle, the right rear rotor was all but frozen on. Only after nearly two hours of pounding it with my five pound sledge hammer did it finally and mercifully come loose.
Kicker was that in order to get at different spots on the back of the rotor I had to rotate the spindle. To do that I had to put the transmission in neutral which meant I needed to put my apply the brakes. Without the pistons compressed back into their housings on the right rear caliper they came out of their housings all but ruining it. Great. $50 later for a new caliper and twenty minutes of bleeding the line with the help of my wife we were good to go. On the right side. Left side comes next weekend. Hopefully that will go much more smoothly. Hopefully. I also have to do the fronts. Light a candle.
At the end of the day I'm left wondering sometimes if all this is worth it to save money - in this case around $400. These projects are really time consuming and my wife complains that all I do lately is work on our (aging) fleet of cars when I'm not at work. This is true but the savings do add up. All told I've probably saved at least $3000 in the last 12 months doing repairs on our cars. Also, you really can't put a price on the feeling of accomplishment and personal satisfaction you get from doing something you didn't think you could do. Or could have done. That's the best. On to the left side and then the fronts!
Again, this is straight forward work. For the rear, remove the two 12mm bolts holding the caliper on and it comes off with a tug or two. The front calipers use a T-55 Torx bolt or star bit. Why they're different is beyond me. Pry the pads out with a screw driver and then remove the caliper bracket by removing its two 18mm bolts. Pull the retainers off the lugs, if they're still on there, and the rotors comes off...well. If only life was that simple.
Save for a slight wiggle, the right rear rotor was all but frozen on. Only after nearly two hours of pounding it with my five pound sledge hammer did it finally and mercifully come loose.
Kicker was that in order to get at different spots on the back of the rotor I had to rotate the spindle. To do that I had to put the transmission in neutral which meant I needed to put my apply the brakes. Without the pistons compressed back into their housings on the right rear caliper they came out of their housings all but ruining it. Great. $50 later for a new caliper and twenty minutes of bleeding the line with the help of my wife we were good to go. On the right side. Left side comes next weekend. Hopefully that will go much more smoothly. Hopefully. I also have to do the fronts. Light a candle.
No comments:
Post a Comment