How to Replace Rear Brake Pads Rotors 2007-09 Chevy Equinox

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In this video, we're going to be working with our 2008 Chevy Equinox. We're going to show you how to remove and replace your rear brake pads and rotors. While we are doing this on the driver side, we always recommend you replace your brakes in pairs per axle, meaning that you do the rears together or the fronts together. If you like this video, please click subscribe. We have a ton more information on this and many other vehicles, and if you want these brakes for your car, you can follow the link down in the description over to 1AAuto.com. Here are the items you'll need for this repair.

Using the 19 millimeter socket and breaker bar, loosen all of your lug nuts about one turn. Raise and support your vehicle. We're using a lift to make it easier to show you what's going on, but this job could easily be done in your driveway or garage with a jack and jack stands.

Normally, you would remove all five of your lug nuts and remove the wheel and tire. However, we've been having a hard time getting these wheels off of the car, because they've been on there so long. So, we'll show you a trick to remove a tire when it's stuck on the hub. We'll remove four of the lug nuts and loosen the top one so it's hanging on by just a couple of threads. The best way to do this is using a dead blow hammer; however, a rubber mallet will work. You don't want to use a steel hammer, because you'll risk damaging the wheel. Go ahead and hit the wheel in as many places as you can reach with your hammer. That's why we leave that lug nut on a couple of threads, so when it pops loose, our wheel doesn't just go flying off. Now, you'll just hold your wheel. Remove that last lug nut, and remove your wheel and tire from the vehicle.

Now, you'll remove the T30 rotor screw. I'm doing this with a Torx socket and a little breaker bar. You may need to use a pry bar between two of the wheel studs to keep it from rotating when you break this screw loose. Sometimes they'll come out without, but usually you're going to have to counter-hold. Once you get it broken loose, it should spin right out nice and easy.

Using a 14 millimeter socket and ratchet, remove the two 14 millimeter bolts securing the caliper to the bracket. Now, sometimes these pins will spin when you go to loosen the bolt. If yours is spinning, it takes a really skinny wrench to get on there. If you don't have one, you can use a pair of pliers, or they're usually not under a lot of torque so you can just kind of hold them and remove the bolts by hand.

Remove the caliper. Normally, we would use a bungee cord or something like that to secure it. However, this is on a pretty short hose. You can set just set it on that control on it. If you want to be a little more secure, you can wrap one around there, a zip tie or some mechanics wire will do that just to be safe. Using a flat blade screwdriver, or a small pry bar, remove the pads from the caliper.

Using the 15 millimeter socket and ratchet, remove the two caliper bracket bolts securing it to the spindle. You do have to be careful, because you have your shock here, so you’re not going to be able to back that one all the way out with a socket and ratchet. If you can't get it out by hand at that point, you may have to switch over and use a wrench. It looks like what we can do here is when that bolt is backed all the way out, you can slide the caliper bracket out, and then you can push the bolt in to remove your ratchet. It looks like this 15 is not going to want to come out past that bolt, but we can pull it out far enough that it doesn't interfere here. So, we'll just leave it there.

Now, you're going to need to save this little rubber plug here, because these aren't included with new rotors most of the time. Just pop that out with a flat blade. We're going to check that our e-brake isn't dragging, and it's not. But if it were, you would spin it around and use this access hole to find the adjuster, which we'll show you when the rotor's off. Back that adjuster off, so the e-brake doesn't drag on the rotor.

Now, if you need to save your rotor because, you’re doing a wheel bearing or something else that requires you to remove this without needing to replace it, you'll want to hit this surface with a hammer being careful not to hit the lug studs. However, if you're actually doing a brake job, you can hit the surface of the rotor for some more leverage, knocking this off.

Using a steel wire brush and the proper safety equipment, like safety glasses and a dust mask, go ahead and scrap all this rust and corrosion off of the hub. You'll want to scrap this off of the surface as well as the hub center here, which is why our rotor was so stuck on.

Here we have our old rotor and brake pads that we removed from our vehicle and our new parts from 1AAuto.com. As you can see, our rotors are the exact same size. We have the drum and hat style here where the e-brake is internal, which is what this access hole is for here. We also have the same bolt pattern and the same little bevel there for our rotor screw. The pads are the exact same size and shape. You can see how badly worn our old ones were. They were just about to the point that they were going to be dragging metal. Over here, the backing shim was actually touching the rotor a little bit. You always want to replace your brake pads and rotors together, unless you have the ability to have your rotors machined down, though that isn't very common in most places. The reason that is, is because there's a deep groove in this rotor, which means that we weren't getting a full, smooth, contact patch, and that it was affecting our braking. Also, being down this thin can cause the rotor to warp more easily from heat, which creates a pulsation while braking. These new parts from 1A Auto are going to go in direct fit, just like our original equipment. We'll fix you up right.

Using a small flat blade screwdriver, carefully pry the shims off of your caliper carrier. Now, ours are still pretty smooth. They don't have a lot of rust build-up on them, so we can just clean these off and reuse them. We'll do the same thing on the place they ride here, on the caliper carrier as well. We'll do this using a wire brush. Be sure you have proper safety equipment on, like some safety glasses and a dust mask so you don't inhale all this harmful debris. Now, all of the dirt and debris is off. You don't have to get these perfectly clean. It's not really likely that you'll get them perfectly clean and looking good and new again. However, as long as you've got all the heavy build-up off, it'll allow the shims to ride in there nice and flat, which will allow your brake pads to move smooth and freely which is really all we're after. Once we've cleaned that off, we'll repeat this process on the shim. If these are really heavily rusted and corroded or cracked, breaking, missing pieces, or they aren't springy any more – you can see this is still moving nicely – then you're going to want to replace them. Ours don't look bad so we can just clean them up. Put some fresh grease on there, and they'll be just fine. We'll want to do this on the front and the back to make sure that everything sits and rides smoothly. Again, just like the carrier, as long as you get the bulk of the stuff off, they don't have to be perfect.

Now, we'll apply a thin coat of grease where our shims are going to ride. Make sure you're using brake specific grease for this. Anything else could get onto the pads and rotors and damage them. Brake grease is designed to be on these components, so it's a lot less harmful if something does happen. Re-install your shim. Then, we'll apply a thin coat of grease to that as well. You can go a little bit thicker here since this is where the pad is actually going to move. Nothing moves on this portion out here, but if you lay a little coat of grease on it's not going to get all rusted and corroded.

While we have the grease out, we'll hold back the boot here on our caliper pin. Remove that. Ours is pretty clean, but if you have a bunch of old gunk and grease buildup on there, you'll want to wipe it off with a paper towel. Apply a good thick coat of fresh grease. Re-install it into the boot. Make sure it suctions on there, and it moves nicely. Then, we'll repeat all of these steps on the other end of our carrier. Now, our caliper carrier's ready to go back on our vehicle.

Apply a thin coat of grease to the hub to make sure your rotor doesn't seize to it in the future, because brakes are a wear item. You may have to do them again some day. Install your rotor onto the hub backwards. Spray it down with some brake cleaner. This removes the coating they use when these are in storage, between the factory and being delivered to you. This prevents them from rusting. However, it is very slick and will affect your braking if you leave it on there. Now, we'll install it the correct way with the beveled hole over the threaded hole in our hub. Spray down this side as well.

Re-install the rotor screw with a T30 Torx bit. Now, it's not dangerous if you've lost this or broken it. All it really does is help keep this rotor in place and make it easier to re-assemble everything, but if you do have it, it's good to put back.

Now, we'll align the hole in the rotor with that adjuster wheel for the e-brake that we showed you earlier. We'll adjust it up by moving it a couple of teeth. Just wait to hear and feel that little bit of drag against the brake. Once that's all set, install the cap.

Re-install the caliper bracket and start your two bolts as far in as you can by hand. Then, finish tightening them down with a socket and ratchet. Torque the caliper bolts to 89 foot-pounds.

Install the brake pads. The little squealer was on the back side when we removed it, so, I'll put it back there, going back together. Apply another thin coat of grease to the back here. Remove whatever you used to secure your caliper. Use a pair of groove-job pliers to compress the piston. Be sure to go nice and slow here. Re-install the caliper and the two 14 millimeter caliper bolts. Torque your caliper bolts to 24 foot pounds. There's an example of that hinge spinning, so I'm going to hold it with a pair of pliers.

Re-install your wheel and tire. Get your 19 millimeter lug nuts on as tight as you can by hand. Put the weight of your vehicle back on the tires. Torque your lug nuts to 100 foot pounds in a cross pattern.

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