Solved 1993 Aerostar. The brakes are grabbing at low speed.

[joshhemming]

I replaced front & back brakes within the last 10K miles.....rotors, pads, drums and shoes. Everything was good initially but recently the brakes grab near the end of a braking action. The van doesn't pull to one side; brakes just engage completely when it's almost ready to stop anyway and the tires scoot for a few feet. They're fine at high speeds....only happens OCCASIONALLY when going under 30 mph and coming near a stop sign or parking place.

A quick Google search returned someone with the same problem but another car model and it turned out to be an ABS sensor. Does my 93 have ABS?

What else could be causing this problem???

 

[Icuff4cash]

I'm not a brake expert, but slow release on anything is caused by drag. Your rears are they drums. Are the springs old not giving enuff kick back at slow speeds. Same thing with disc are the Pistons gummy with brake dust causing them to have drag. It would be more noticeable at low speed due to mass spinning. My brakes were dragging on my pilot it was dust gremlins so I needed to clean my front left brake got dirty more than the other. Like I said I'm no brake expert

 

[don-ohio]

Self-adjusters on rear could be over adjusting. Probably not,but it CAN happen.Been there.....suffered that! LOL! don-ohio ^)

 

[zenish]

gms have a problem with the brake hoses collapsing on the inside and looking fine outside.i don't know if fords have the same problem.

 

[BrooklynBay]

Clean the front & rear brakes with brake cleaner, then adjust the rear brakes.

 

[ajkoons]

Both my F150 and my sport track (both with rear drums) do this when its time to bleed the brakes. Have you done this yet?

 

[joshhemming]

Both my F150 and my sport track (both with rear drums) do this when its time to bleed the brakes. Have you done this yet?

No, I've had the van over 10 years, put 80K miles on it myself in addition to the 92 K it had when I bought it and never had to bleed the brake lines. I replaced the pads, rotors, shoes and drums along the associated springs about 10K ago.

I've not noticed any other air in the brake line type symptoms. But I suppose anything is possible. I have one of those one-man brake bleeder kits so I'll give it a try.

 

[BrooklynBay]

Old contaminated brake fluid could absorb air. Be careful not to crack off the old bleeder screws from the calipers or drums. Dorman sells bleeder screws with built in check valves which makes the job much easier than having to use a separate one man bleeder tool.

 

[joshhemming]

I appear to have solved the problem! While replacing my air filter last month I decided to wipe some of the grime off various components under the hood. When I did the master cylinder, I discovered that the brake fluid level was almost at the bottom of the reservoir. I couldn't see it before because of the grime on the sides of the reservoir. I filled it to the MAX mark with DOT 3 and the brakes haven't grabbed since. I've driven it several times and cannot get the problem to repeat so I'm sure you can mark this as PROBLEM SOLVED.

 

[BrooklynBay]

Thanks for the update. Your thread is now marked solved.

 

[Adam_tinkerer]

I had a similar problem. I could feel the rear brakes reluctantly 'letting go' after stopping at a light. Eventually realized I'd bumped the e brake handle while vaccuming the interior the weekend before!!!