I don't know what I am missing. The car braked fine before, but I decided to get new brakes/rotors because they were old.

The fronts were easy, caliper off, compressed with a c clamp, new pads on, caliper slipped right over rotor.

The backs are killing me (9 bolt rear, disc brakes). I CANNOT get the piston in enough with a c clamp. When I put the pads on, it is not wide enough to go over the rotor. I know the piston is not going in enough. Am I missing something? This is on both sides in the back.


Any help would be appreciated,


Thanks.

 

The rear pistons don't press in, they screw in. All a C clamp is going to do is strip the threads.

 

Get the special tool and wrench them in.

 

So glad I read this before I attempted a brake job on the beast. I hope your rear calipers are all right. Last I checked they were $100 each reman from a local parts stop.

 

Well don't I feel stupid, thanks for the replies. I'll give it a shot. I didn't force too much, I'm sure I didn't strip the threads. I said more "WTF's" than anything else, lol.

 

You can do it with a set of needle nose pliers and a steady hand..just wear gloves!!

Ed

 

I can't believe my Haynes manual does not tell me this. I just read it over again and it says nothing about it.

 

Haynes and Chilton manuals pretend the 9-bolt doesn't exist. I don't even think my HELM manual says a whole lot about it. Black sheep of the rear axles, if you ask me.

 

Doesn't matter if its 9 bolt or 10 bolt, the brakes are the same.

 

Wow, my manual tells me to use a special tool to "push" the piston in (says nothing about screwing). I better read it again to make sure I'm not missing something here before I claim the book is wrong.

 

The "special tool" puts pressure on the piston face, and has tangs to engage the dimples in the piston face to turn it at the same time.

 

When screwing these back in, are both sides counter clockwise to retract them?

 

I don't remember if they're clockwise or counterclockwise, but both of them turn the same way.

 

Clockwise. You'll see it start moving in right away. (I used the needle nose pliers trick)

 

This will sound odd... But I just did my back brakes about a month ago. I've got a 9 bolt 4 wheel, non 1le. And with the caliper fully pressed in, and with new rotors and pads... The pads were literally too thick to fit.

I had to go back and buy different pads cause they simply did not fit. The plyers trick works good. If you wanted the tool they are like $40-$50 off of Ebay.

Whatever you do... Do NOT remove the Ebrake lever to attempt to screw the piston back in at all. The damn piston will eventually slip right out and it's near IMPOSSIBLE to get the damn thing back in right. I did that, and learnt from it. Luckily I'm friends with my parts guy and he took it back calling it defective.

Long story short, just use the plyers in the grooves and ease her back in, and if it still don't fit. Get diff pads