Commonly Overlooked Brake Installation Steps - Brake Job Details You Mightve Missed

What's up, guys. I'm Andy. Brake jobs, overall, are pretty simple, but whether you're a beginner or you've been doing it for years and you're just kinda doing it mindless, there's things that you can overlook. So let's get into them.

The basics behind a brake job are taking the caliper off, take the brake pads off, take the caliper bracket off, take the rotor off, and then reverse for putting it back together. Something that's overlooked and often forgotten about is the caliper slide pins. Now with the caliper compressed, the caliper needs to move back and forth like this. So there's a pin right there that goes in and out, and same on the bottom. And those can not be frozen. If they're frozen, you're gonna have some issues. Let's take a look at these pins a little bit closer. We have the bracket right here and the pin slide into the bracket. And they both move. These are fine. If one of these is bound up, basically the brake caliper is gonna be putting pressure on the outboard pad and causing it to wear unevenly and prematurely. So to avoid this from happening, whenever you do a brake job, make sure you pull these slide pins out, clean them off, and grease them. And make sure you check the boots also. Sometimes the boots come off with the pin. Just take a look at those, make sure they're not cracked.

A lot of times you can get boot kits separately. So you just buy a boot kit, and you can also buy a pin kit if you had a pin that had excessive corrosion on it and needed replacement. Now sometimes you'll find that the boot is completely missing and the pin is just frozen in there, just like that. And what you can do in that case, you can take some rust penetrant and try to spray it in there. Let it soak. Sometimes you have to let it soak overnight, but also take the caliper and pin and put it upside down in a vise, just like this. And then with that in there, you can always take a pry bar and just try to pry and twist it back and forth. As you're twisting, try to lift it up. Hopefully, that breaks it free from the stuck pin. In the event that it was that bad, sometimes using a little bit of heat on the brake caliper bracket can help you release those. I don't like to use a lot of heat on the caliper bracket, but in emergencies, you might have to do that. And then in that case, you probably need to replace the pin.

You wanna clean the bore of that out, use some type of a wire brush. Just get any corrosion or rust out of there. Now we're gonna put the boot back on, grease up the pin, and reinstall it. And make sure you can see exactly where the boot's supposed to go. That's what people forget to attach right there. Make sure it goes all the way on the boot, so it goes all the way around. Just like that. You do the same on the other side. In the event that you can't get the pin out, a lot of times these caliper brackets are available so you can buy a new bracket. While we're talking about the bracket, let's talk about how the brake pads fit in the bracket. So you want the pads to slide just slightly. So this slides nice and just very slightly. It's not binding up at all, but it's not too loose. And that's why you have those pad clips there. You take this other pad on the outside, slide it in position. This is actually binding up right here on this side. So that's too tight. This side is not too bad, but over here, I can't even move it. So that's too tight. And like our other videos, you just need to clean this contact area right here. You may even need a file. Sometimes a wire brush doesn't do it, and you just take away some of the surface material.

On the flip side, when you install the pads, you don't want them so loose that they're gonna be rattling around in the car. So keep that in mind. Don't take off too much material. But it's always a good idea to check before you put the bracket back on the car. Any of these problems with the bracket, whether the pads are sticking or the pins are sticking, you may not notice anything while you're driving the vehicle that day that you do the job, but over time, you're gonna wear the brakes out faster or it's gonna cause a drivability issue with the brakes. Taking a look at the brake caliper itself, you wanna look at this seal right here. Make sure it doesn't look like it's damaged, or ripped, or torn. People forget about this all the time. You do a brake job, when you compress the caliper, the boot moves and it actually gets stuck on the caliper and causes it to rip. So just double-check that, make sure it doesn't seem ripped. Be careful if you're using a pick. You could take a screwdriver and just go around and look.

And that's gonna cause the caliper to seize up if you have any rips in there and the caliper is gonna need to be replaced. And if you just replaced the brake pads and it caused the caliper to freeze, you're gonna end up needing new pads and rotors as well. And while you're here looking at the caliper, make sure the brake hoses look like they're in good shape. Make sure they're not cracking. If there's excessive rust on the brake hose down here, or even the bleeder screw. With the caps on them, they tend to not rust through like others that don't have the caps. So check those out. In the event there is something wrong with the caliper, you're just gonna have to replace it. Let's talk about parking brake shoes. People overlook these all the time. Right here, they're a similar setup to how old-style drum brakes would work. There's two shoes. And when you pull on the cable, there's a little lever down here and they're gonna expand. And they do need to be adjusted and you need to make sure the linings are still good. Make sure they're not falling apart. These ones look good. Here's the brake adjuster. You wanna use a straight blade screwdriver to make that adjustment.

Make sure that spins. If it's not spinning and binding up, that's gonna need to be taken out, either replaced or lubricated. Now, when you're making the adjustments when you put the hat of the drum on, you want minimal contact, just barely rubbing. And it's always a great idea to just double-check and either push down on that foot lever or pull up that handbrake and see if it's actually grabbing. Sometimes these pivots freeze up and you actually need to replace them. When you're adjusting the parking brake, you could see if this is binding up. In that case, you want to either lubricate it somehow or replace it. If you look at these brake shoes, the lining has separated from the backing. So that's not good. And that's not gonna work at all. You don't wanna put your brakes back together with the brake shoes looking like this.

Take a look at the shield. It mostly...it keeps rocks out of hitting your rotor, but it could be dented or it could be severely rotted and rubbing on the rotor. Now, most of that's just gonna give you an annoying noise, it's not necessarily a safety item. But it's something you wanna take a look at. Everyone always forgets to check the parking brake. So make sure you try that. Make sure it holds the car both going forward or in reverse and adjust accordingly. Now also while you're driving down the road, if you notice some burning smell or some hot smell coming from the rear, it's probably because you tightened them up too tight. So you're gonna have to loosen them. And while you're in this area, take a look at the brake pedal. Sometimes the rubber wears out or it even falls off. And these are fairly inexpensive to replace and easy to do.

So those are our overlooked items on doing a brake job. If there's anything I overlooked or anything you can think of, leave me a comment below. If you enjoyed this video, make sure you give it a thumbs up and subscribe to our channel, ring the bell, turn on all notifications so you don't miss any of our videos.