"frozen" caliper bolts

[ephantmon]

I changed the front rotors and pads today, as the Liberty had picked up quite the shudder when braking firmly to hard. I noticed the upper caliper guide pins on both the driver's and passenger's side were frozen in the "closed" position (pressed in towards the rotor). The bottom pins had good movement.

I managed to pull the pins and regrease them. After re-installing them, they had better movement, but still not like the bottom pins. Do I need to/should I replace the pins? The whole caliper? Is it likely this led to the shudder I was feeling?

 

[tommudd]

NAPA has the kit, I would replace them and get the proper grease to use on the pins

 

[ephantmon]

So I replaced the pins on both sides, the stuck ones and unstuck ones. Not much seemed to change. When I put in the new pins and bushings (greased) into the caliper bracket and pushed them in/out a few times, the one side still had almost no movement while the other sprung back beautifully.

One thing I noticed was that the "stuck" pins were the ones with the fully square heads (lower pin on driver's side, upper pin on passenger's). The other two, the ones with the partially rounded sides were the "springy" ones.

Is it possible there's a problem/defect with the caliper bracket? Those are cheap enough to get through Rockauto.com, but I don't want to randomly start throwing parts at a problem, hoping to fix it.

 

[cplchris]

its not your caliper, its the rubber bushing on the slide pin they swell up when they have grease on them, even with the stuff tom is talking about, (special grease for caliper slide pins), they still swell up and cause the pin to hang up, youre options are replace the slide pins and use the correct grease with the bushings on which will slow down the swelling, or to remove the bushing completey and make it a habit to pull the slide pins 2 times a year and inspect and grease them thoroughly.

 

[LetFreedomRing]

its not your caliper, its the rubber bushing on the slide pin they swell up when they have grease on them, even with the stuff tom is talking about, (special grease for caliper slide pins), they still swell up and cause the pin to hang up, youre options are replace the slide pins and use the correct grease with the bushings on which will slow down the swelling, or to remove the bushing completey and make it a habit to pull the slide pins 2 times a year and inspect and grease them thoroughly.

This. I had to cut my rubber bushings off. Just pack a little extra grease in there so they don't clang around. No extra noises and now they slide beautifully. I think Troy was the one who recommended doing it.

 

[cplchris]

yea its always been an issue on all of fords brakes, all those bushings do is cause problems

 

[ephantmon]

And now my brakes squeal like a stuck pig. Do I need more grease inside them?

 

[LetFreedomRing]

And now my brakes squeal like a stuck pig. Do I need more grease inside them?

I packed mine full, although the squeal could be from your pads actually seated correctly now. Where your pads worn funny at all?

 

[ephantmon]

I packed mine full, although the squeal could be from your pads actually seated correctly now. Where your pads worn funny at all?

They were installed brand new two weeks ago, so no, there's really no visible wear pattern at all so far.

 

[JeepJeepster]

My slide pins were also frozen, brakes hardly worked. Replaced the slide pins and used synthetic slide pin grease (bought at advance) on both slide pins and they seem to be working great. Been a few months since Ive had the caliper off but the brakes are working fantastic.

 

[ephantmon]

Took them apart, re-greased the pins, also found two loose retainer clips on the driver's side. After reassembly, no squeal!