Soft/Excessive Travel Brake Pedal - SOLVED | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

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Soft/Excessive Travel Brake Pedal - SOLVED

akorna

New Member
Joined
September 17, 2014
Messages
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City, State
Virginia Beach
Year, Model & Trim Level
2006 Explorer XLT 4.6 4x4
This is embarrassing, but easy to replicate. Had a stuck rear caliper piston that would not release and fried the pads. Replaced calipers, pads, E-brake shoes and hardware and rotors - ended up with a soft pedal with excessive travel. Replaced master cylinder, no improvement. Bled the system a two dozen times including HCU bleed with scan tool without improvement. Ordered a used revised TSB pedal assembly to arrive tomorrow. Final solution:

The rear calipers were switched, resulting in a bleed screw below the cylinder bore. These calipers are interchangeable from left to right. You must install with the bleed screw oriented above the brake line banjo bolt, otherwise a pocket of air will exist that is impossible to bleed the air out. I can't believe I did this.
 






Welcome, and don't feel bad, it happens a LOT more than one would think. Calipers usually get switched when both sides are removed at the same time, often to save an extra trip for core return/refund. Here's a few threads resulting in the same goof, there are MANY more. Enjoy your COMPLETE brake rebuild, at least the Explorer has fresh brakes and is good to go for a while. :thumbsup:

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Don't feel bad, my MECHANIC did this on a 2004 F350 pickup a few years ago. I was picking up my wife's car and he was appoligising for the delay saying he been fighting with this pickup in the other bay most of the day, and just can't seem to get a firm brake pedal. I peeked over as one guy pumped, and the other guy cracked open the bleeder. I then commented to the mechanic I was dealing with that it's odd that the bleeder screw is located lower then the inlet hose. It was then that he realized they must have installed both rear calipers on the wrong side. I didn't realize it was wrong, I just commented that it was odd, and then the mechanic figure it out immediately what was wrong.
 






Don't feel bad. We've all made dumb mistakes. BTW. Never push you brake pedal to bleed brakes with the caliper off the rotor. Also never do it a second time the same day.
 






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