co4wheel

Mine are great NOW. I don't mind doing a little preventive maintenance to keep them from freezing up in the future. Never ever had a piston freeze/rust up inside a caliper. Never seen it. Don't know what to do to prevent it. Is a seal failing allowing water in to rust? Whats the deal?

melcoeb

make sure your caliper bolts are well greased.

SkeetShoot

^ Not sure if that is going to work for the front calipers. They use slide pins that are not enclosed so greasing them is not going to really do to much for the piston freezing.

The only thing I could maybe see being a preventative measure would be to takt the caliper off the rotor. Remove the brakes and grease the boot where the pistons come out. Other than that, once moisture gets in there, its only a matter of time before it wears on the slip-o-ring.

dkotanto

I bought the caliper repair kit and I rebuilt both front calipers. The pistons weren't sticking bad and after cleaning them and greasing them with the supplied lube, they moved freely. I think the key is to keep the pistons greased and the boots sealed tight. The kit comes with the rings that keep the boots sealed.

This the kit, not too bad of a job but definitely time consuming:

melcoeb

Interesting. How long did it take you to do the rebuild?

fastnoypi

i found an interesting article regarding the use of Castrol red rubber grease for brake pistons. It is rubber compatible for the seals and not petroleum based so it will not contaminate brake fluid. It also contains a rust inhibitor and used in applications like motorcycle shocks.

I lost the original article i was reading but here is one that outline its uses http://www.redrubbergrease.com/

co4wheel

OK. That is what I was thinking it would require. I would think as long as the boot is in good shape I am OK. That is not too bad of a job from the look of it. Just takes a little time and then you bleed the entire system. Thanks.

co4wheel

If the original seal is in good shape you could just use that sparingly under the boot as a preventative measure.

Thanks.

dkotanto

First caliper took a while, around 2-3 hours but the second one was a lot quicker.

dkotanto

Here's a youtube video that was very helpful:

BlackCat81

So you'll replace rotors instead of machining them but you'll rebuild a caliper instead of replacing it?

BlackCat81

Caliper bolts? Our front calipers don't use slide pins like they use in the rear. It's the actual Pistons that seize in the bore.

co4wheel

The kit cost $15. To rebuild both caliper or just replace the exterior dust boot is easy and cheap insurance and preventive maintence.

And I buy quality rotors. Not the cheapest. But I would use cheaper rotors before I machined the ones on my truck which are already likely cheap Chinese as I bought it used