The Sheriff

Welp, that was a bust.

Got everything done and brakes bled. Took it out for a test drive. lost brakes at 50mph. Couple slow pumps and they're back. Back so well I could lock the fronts without too much effort once I got pedal. But now I know I have a leak.

Get home and start crawling under the thing and notice the entire passenger wheel well was wet. damn. Time to find which line was loose. None. :/ What now? Get inside and pump the brakes and run over to the passenger side to see drips of the caliper. Hang my head, I know this is going to be bad.

Take the caliper off, take the pads out and the back of the outboard pad is wet. Drop the pads and squeeze the pistons in, almost got a bath in fluid from the line orifice. Plugged that up and tried again. Sure as **** the upper outboard piston is leaking. I swore. Alot.

Calmed down and noticed a small wet spot in the driveway where I tested the brakes before actually going on the road. And then another one in the garage where it had been sitting overnight. If I had done one more check of the ground before I left would wouldn't have been on the road at 50 with only rear brakes.

I'm about done with this setup. Or the car. One of the two.

Been looking over the wilwood drum to disc setup. most of the measurements are very close. Like within 30 thou on the spindle bearing surface to thread distance. Not sure at that point if it's moot or not but it's close. Bearing surfaces, seal surfaces are the same. The only thing I wouldn't have with one of their kits is a mounting bracket. But I has mill and I has material. Just can't measure for ****...hah.

Stock mounting holes on factory caliper are just over 6.6 inch center to centrer. Wilwoods are 5.25.

Lets see if I get pissed off enough to pull the trigger or not. That depends a lot on the customer service from RockAuto. We shall see.
 
Welp, that was a bust.

Got everything done and brakes bled. Took it out for a test drive. lost brakes at 50mph. Couple slow pumps and they're back. Back so well I could lock the fronts without too much effort once I got pedal. But now I know I have a leak.

Get home and start crawling under the thing and notice the entire passenger wheel well was wet. damn. Time to find which line was loose. None. :/ What now? Get inside and pump the brakes and run over to the passenger side to see drips of the caliper. Hang my head, I know this is going to be bad.

Take the caliper off, take the pads out and the back of the outboard pad is wet. Drop the pads and squeeze the pistons in, almost got a bath in fluid from the line orifice. Plugged that up and tried again. Sure as **** the upper outboard piston is leaking. I swore. Alot.

Calmed down and noticed a small wet spot in the driveway where I tested the brakes before actually going on the road. And then another one in the garage where it had been sitting overnight. If I had done one more check of the ground before I left would wouldn't have been on the road at 50 with only rear brakes.

I'm about done with this setup. Or the car. One of the two.

Been looking over the wilwood drum to disc setup. most of the measurements are very close. Like within 30 thou on the spindle bearing surface to thread distance. Not sure at that point if it's moot or not but it's close. Bearing surfaces, seal surfaces are the same. The only thing I wouldn't have with one of their kits is a mounting bracket. But I has mill and I has material. Just can't measure for ****...hah.

Stock mounting holes on factory caliper are just over 6.6 inch center to centrer. Wilwoods are 5.25.

Lets see if I get pissed off enough to pull the trigger or not. That depends a lot on the customer service from RockAuto. We shall see.
Sorry man, I'm just glad nothing bad happened.
 
New caliper arrived today. I'll be damned if it doesn't look just like the last one where half the piston boot isn't completely seated. Cardone for those with inquiring minds.

I'll be out tomorrow to try and seat the boot, if not back to RA it goes. Oddly it's on the same exact piston in the same spot. They either have process or QA problem. Wait, obviously it's both.

I'll spray it up tomorrow and then see about getting it installed. For tonight I get to fill kids bags with teeth rotting candy.

Oh yeah the youngin' busted his arm yesterday. Got it cast up today. So that was fun.
 
Oh yeah the youngin' busted his arm yesterday. Got it cast up today. So that was fun.
More so for him I bet...

Cardone was always the worst... who would have thought they would out survive so many rebuilders and grow as big as they have? I wonder what their backstory is?
 
I would kill to look inside one of their locations and watch the rebuilding process.
The should have done that on, How it's Made.
HiM did one on rebuilding car batteries. Ugh..
 
I've used now up to 50y.o.NOS brake parts even the rubber grommets for my European cars and never had any Problems with These in contrast to one single repop I ever used and threw away right after installing and bleeding.
 
The only problem the old ones have is a seized piston or two.

The funny thing is, aside from the rubber being installed piss poor, the unit itself seems to be really well machined. You can tell they machined certain parts simply for clean up probably for pitting etc and those areas look great. No chatter marks, no mis-alignments, nada.

MPmTmzYKNpU90cDLo0KoL4lQLWwvRzI7ndRxc9U4MxVPVHCOP3G35sE2zGvAG730xX8pflV9BS76CDYBS=w1172-h1562-no.jpg
 
Prolly just got an old machinist in need of work when he ran out of money from his reverse mortgage.... The kids still assemble the damn things.
 
So the brake issue seems to have calmed down a bit. I still have decent brakes but not what I call outstanding. Perhaps no better nor worse than what they were before the pistons stuck in the old calipers.

Went out for about a 20 mile drive, on the way back the car started to break up at higher rpm, then about 2 miles from the house started to surge real bad. Not enough to kill it but enough to make the drive not any fun.

Got home started looking things over and wasn't getting much fuel in the filter. Also noticed that the pump sounded strange. Like it wasn't getting fuel from the tank. Got the arse end up on jack stands and was going to pull the sender to see if it was clogged, and that's when I saw it. I forgot to pull the cap I put on the vent when I was tacking the exhaust together. DOH. Removed the rubber cap, got fuel in the nose, went for a drive, problem solved.
 
Yeah. Nice when they work out.

Now for some unknown reason I've resolved myself to replacing the windshield in the next month or two. I've got one shot as I only have the one extra. Lord help me.
 
Nissan? Toyota? Hyundai? :lol:

I like where your head is, but that's bound to get someone fired up :usflag::drama:
 
Nissan? Toyota? Hyundai? :lol:

I like where your head is, but that's bound to get someone fired up :usflag::drama:


Lincoln MKZ.

Have to open the center bore to 3.24-3.25", the backside has to be opened up to about 6.5". Once it's taken to minimum thickness for the car it's supposed to be on, there's only .162" difference between the new and old rotor to deal with. If you have someone willing to cut the rotor down to what the original Budd Rotor width is, you only have to adjust the caliper .090" to the inside towards the engine bay. That's either on the hub hat where the rotor mounts or from the caliper mounts.

Found it by accident. Best part is the rotors are only $27 Raybestos. $16 for the discount DuraGo's.
 
Last edited:
Lincoln MKZ.

Have to open the center bore to 3.24-3.25", the backside has to be opened up to about 6.5". Once it's taken to minimum thickness for the car it's supposed to be on, there's only .162" difference between the new and old rotor to deal with. If you have someone willing to cut the rotor down to what the original Budd Rotor width is, you only have to adjust the caliper .090" to the inside towards the engine bay. That's either on the hub hat where the rotor mounts or from the caliper mounts.

Found it by accident. Best part is the rotors are only $27 Raybestos. $16 for the discount DuraGo's.
I would pass, if I was asked to do this professionally... but I do see a lot of meat available for what you want to do.

I know this may seem a bit off, but you might get some of your clearance by grinding the face of the new pads as well. Back when we used to sand brake pads, a piece of 80 grit or a clean rough sidewalk would remove a little material pretty fast. Before it was unpopular to produce any brake lining dust (and once in a while after), we'd sand a chamfer at the leading and trailing edges of some new pads to help with noise issues. Some new pads already have it.

Good luck, I'm looking forward to your results.
 
Back
Top