Brakes pulse/surge and looking for opinions on parts

[MidnightRebel07]

Put the fitting and washer on there with the bolt, finger tighten to see how much gap there is to make sure it's not too much, I would use either a red or black RTV gasket sealer if it fits without wiggling to seal it. You might need to use thread tape above the hole on the bolt. If you feel you don't want to go this route than you can exchange for another caliper.

 

[Kjhadfield]

Put the fitting and washer on there with the bolt, finger tighten to see how much gap there is to make sure it's not too much, I would use either a red or black RTV gasket sealer if it fits without wiggling to seal it. You might need to use thread tape above the hole on the bolt. If you feel you don't want to go this route than you can exchange for another caliper.

Called rock auto and emailed them photos of the 2, they called raybestos and was told it shouldn't leak and they both haven't heard of this pn having issues. They said to install it, so I'll install tomorrow and hope for the best…but given it has no grooves on the mating surface around caliper inlet, I'm doubtful. After all the searching I've done, I've come to the conclusion that the grooves are there for a reason TO SEAL when the crush washer gets crushed…therefore imprinting in the grooves. I mean this makes perfect sense to me.

If it leaks I'll send back for another replacement. I'm not even going to go through all the trouble of painting them again, not until I at least can confirm they are leak free.

I was thinking/wondering if it would be a good idea to heat up the crush washers red hot and drop in water, then install. I thought I read over time they harden and I guess by the time you install they won't exactly crush like they are supposed to until you get them "dead soft"? Any thoughts

 

[MidnightRebel07]

I wouldn't mess with heating the washers, just install them and go from there.

 

[Kjhadfield]

I had a whole post I wrote for an update and it cleared out, damn. I don't feel like doing that again, maybe I'll summarize later.

So far so good, no leaks. Ended up with a complete front brakes overhaul…new pads, rotor, calipers, brake hoses and even down to new banjo bolts, brake hose clips and caliper mounting bolts. I'm glad I did this myself (of course with the help of the members here and YouTube) and with as rusted as everything is down there, this will make future maintenance that much easier. I didn't paint these calipers cause I was expecting a leak, so at a later date will pull wheel and paint them black. I'll paint them still attached by the hose since I'm finally leak free I don't want to chance it. Thanks to all that helped!

 

[MidnightRebel07]

Awesome news man!!! Glad to hear it's all working for you now.

 

[swshawaii]

We know this caused you great frustration, but doing it yourself saved you big bucks and gaining experience was worthwhile.

Curious what the source of the leaks were. Exchanged calipers, banjo bolts, etc. Think new brake hoses had anything to to with it?

 

[Kjhadfield]

Oh I agree, labor would of been an arm & leg (I'm guessing a couple hundred? I don't know). But your right, the cherry was getting my hands dirty. Not only will I never go to the shop for a brake service but this has given me the confidence to do other repairs just knowing I overcame this (had to get creative at times) and knowing it will be done right or thoroughly.

That long post that cleared out on me, I mentioned the few things that I think went wrong and I refered to you and your past suggestion. I'll try to remember how it went…

I think a few of the things that could of caused the leak with the 1st set of remans are more of a combination of minor things. 1 is the suggestion from swshawaii, to torque the banjo bolt to spec. I admit I didn't because of fear of snapping the banjo bolt again. I did torque it down on this 2nd set, mainly because the one caliper didn't even have grooves (completely flat) so I figured this would leak for sure and I'd send it back anyways. So I had new banjo bolts and I thought I was going to snap these as well but it finally clicked. 2 is when I broke the old banjo bolt I used the crush washers that were sent with the remans and had to buy new ones when I got the new bolts. These washers were the right spec for the bolts but seemed thinner (using the thickest ones) than the reman washers but I didn't have a way to compare. When I got the 2nd set of remans the washers were same od but night and day on thickness and 3 the banjo fitting was rusty (around where the original washer sat) so it's possible the washer didn't seat exactly were the original did and overlapped on the formed rust. With one of the calipers in the 2set of remans being completely flat (no grooves), this leads me to believe is was probably a combination of 1 of the 3 above because that's the only changes I made besides a new caliper (which could of still been the issue but)

I'll list all the parts later that I used with pn since this was a thread of opinions on brake parts/brands also

 

[Kjhadfield]

Since I asked for opinions on parts, I'll list the parts I decided to go with. This is just the front brakes on an 02 4wd. I ordered from rock auto (using 5% discount from this site) and Amazon (prime, free shipping)

Wagner thermo quiet ceramic pads-qc833 (1)
Raybestos advanced technology rotors-680027 (2)
Raybestos drag reduction clips-h6011 (1)
Raybestos reman caliper-frc11203 (1) & frc11204 (1)
Dorman caliper bracket bolts-13898 (2)
Dorman brake hose (banjo) bolt-13947 (2)
Raybestos brake hose-bh380357 (1) & bh380358 (1)
Dorman brake hose clips-hw1457 (1)

also…
Crc brake & caliper grease
Crc brake cleaner
Prestone high temp synthetic brake fluid dot3
Permatex red threadlocker

I only had to buy a couple tools
Torque wrench
11mm flare (line) wrench
Propane torch

And used
15mm-6 point socket
14mm-6 point socket
3/8-6 point socket
3/8 wrench
3/4-6 point socket
Breaker bar
Flat screw driver
Hammer

With the caliper mounting bolts, I had to really put effort with the breaker bar and propane torch to break loose those bolts. I had to hammer out the brake hose fitting (to hard line) from the bracket because it was rusted together. I also used the crush washers that came with the reman calipers because these were thicker than the dorman and the washers included with the brake hoses.

Between the members here and YouTube I was able to do this on my own for the 1st time. For YouTube I watched videos from ericthecarguy and chrisfix, very helpful.

Thank you and I hope this can help others