1967 Chrysler New Yorker - Budd Disc Brakes rebuilt, seems too tight!

Molepar28 · Wednesday at 12:58 PM

Hello all, I'm currently redoing the front disc brakes on my 1967 Chrysler New Yorker 4 door. It uses the Budd disc brakes. Craig from Mobileparts saved me, and provided me with NOS pads. He's very cool. I have NOS rotors, that had some rust, so I had them turned. I have rebuilt calipers that I have been running on the car already, and they work well. I had a heck of a time getting the calipers with the pads back on the rotor. In fact, I had to separate the two half of the caliper, put the pads in, and bolt the two halves back together! In the 1967 Chrysler manual, it says to use a Chrysler tool, Piston Compression tool C-3992, which I do not have. There was no way I could get the caliper back onto the rotor with the new pads. I got everything together on the driver's side, and it seems very tight! Basically, the two halves are together, pads are in there, but dangit, are they supposed to be that tight? oof!

bronze turbine · Wednesday at 1:33 PM

I don't know how tight your brakes are without actually trying to spin the wheel myself, but I do know that I've had some cars where the front wheels with the disc brakes were very hard to turn by hand. I would say that if you can turn it by hand at all it's probably OK. Disc brakes always drag a little bit by design. Also, maybe the pads or the pistons need to seat themselves. Also, with the disc being just freshly ground and the pads being new, they are really gripping each other.

CBODY67 · Wednesday at 2:34 PM

There is a universal aftermarket tool that many auto supplies (that carry an assortment of tools on a rotating sales rack) have that is designed just to push the pads/pistons into the calipers at the time of installation. Even so, the LAST part of the installation process and BEFORE test driving is to fully apply the brakes several times to ensure the pads are fully-seated into the caliper.

MANY OEM tools are also in the aftermarket, just not referenced to the OEM tool part number. Might also try searching in Google, as in Brake Pad compressor?

The earlier disc brake systems let the pads lightly rub against the rotor with the brakes not applied. Unlike the modern calipers which will let the pads more-fully retract for less drag (i.e., fuel economy concerns).

CBODY67

Molepar28 · Thursday at 12:26 PM

Thanks for all of the good advice. Brakes are all back on the car. I can rotate the front tires with some resistance, it actually seems ok. It feels like the correct amount of drag, especially with freshly turned, NOS rotors, (they were rusty, from eBay) The rusty NOS eBay rotor guy still has sets for sale. I got both sides back together by bolting the inner half of the caliper to the steering knuckle, there is NO WAY in tarnation that I would have been able to slide the assembled caliper with pads onto the rotor. Brakes are bled, now to break them in properly.