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Recently I upgraded my pads and rotors. My shop had to shave the pads a few mm to get the pads to fit. Apparently the calipers have plate lift corrosion making it hard to get the pads to fit in. I have read through numerous posts but cannot find a permanent solution to this.
What have you all done to fix the plate lift/pad fitting issue with these 25+ year old calipers?
What I did was a full caliper rebuild using almost all factory parts on all four calipers. The plates were reused, but I bought new Brembo seals and pistons from Sunset at a cost of ~$35/hole (x16.... ouch). The calipers themselves were pretty badly pitted so I blasted them down to bare metal and sought to level the plate support area with JB weld. Worked OK, and my brakes are back on the car and working well.
It was a total PITA and took a long time. I'm glad it's done, but if I had to do it again you'd better believe I'd send the damn things to Eric at PMB or find some other professional stuckee to handle it.
If it bugs you, take the plates out and scrape out the corrosion . You can repaint or simply sludge the area w copper grease and check it everytime the pads get changed.
What I did was a full caliper rebuild using almost all factory parts on all four calipers. The plates were reused, but I bought new Brembo seals and pistons from Sunset at a cost of ~$35/hole (x16.... ouch). The calipers themselves were pretty badly pitted so I blasted them down to bare metal and sought to level the plate support area with JB weld. Worked OK, and my brakes are back on the car and working well.
It was a total PITA and took a long time. I'm glad it's done, but if I had to do it again you'd better believe I'd send the damn things to Eric at PMB or find some other professional stuckee to handle it.
I have never seen corrosion like that on a caliper before that is really bad. How were the piston bores? If they have any corrosion it is time for some replacements. I would have thought second hand calipers in good condition would have cost less than the plates which run around $110 a caliper plus $35 x 16.
Every one of us that drives in the salt and rain has calipers that have that type of corrosion under the plates...since I can't post a video here in the grave talk app, I'll post one right now on my dbfd Motorsport Facebook page...check it out...I was laughing at how terrible it was. And the votes were perfect...just you get this crazy cathodic corrosion with the salt, steel, alluminum, water and heat...crazy....
Every one of us that drives in the salt and rain has calipers that have that type of corrosion under the plates...since I can't post a video here in the grave talk app, I'll post one right now on my dbfd Motorsport Facebook page...check it out...I was laughing at how terrible it was. And the votes were perfect...just you get this crazy cathodic corrosion with the salt, steel, alluminum, water and heat...crazy....
My 90 C4 sat outside in the rain and snow for 10 years. My calipers were perfect. The calipers are anodized and then painted. The only way they could get that bad is if both the paint and anodizing was removed and plates installed without anything to prevent the reaction. I have rebuilt maybe 100 calipers over the years and never seen anything that bad.
I hear you...and I don't disagree that they shouldn't, but the last two sets I did were just like that...
I have another set that came off my car and were the original calipers. I'll be interested to see if they are similar, since I know pretty much every raindrop and spec of salt that hit my car since 58k miles when it was still like new...
Guys. I highly recommend simply grinding the sides of your pads to make them fit, if you have plate lift. Getting the plates out to fix them is a crazy pain in the ***.
So don't go crazy. It's not necessary to remove plate lift. Wait till you are going to do a complete caliper rebuild.
03-12-2016, 11:11 PM
Brake Caliper Plate Lift
