Cantanko

Got the calipers serviced today – of the eight pistons, only one was seized and even then not badly. A bit of pounding with a hammer and an aluminium drift had it freed up in ten minutes or so, with most of the time spent cleaning out the calipers themselves, all of the oilways, seal seats and piston faces.

There was a bit of tarnishing on the pistons but not enough to cause either seal damage or concern, however I will probably change the pistons out next year – it’s been put into the maintenance schedule so I don’t forget

I’ve done about sixty miles on the new discs and they appear to be bedding in very well. There are no fluid leaks that I can find and it stops straight and true, rather unlike the way it did before the service!

All in all, quite a successful outcome

I picked up the caliper service parts from Inchcape Derby today – not bad considering the parts were only ordered Wednesday. So far, they’ve always managed to get me bits and pieces for the truck within 48 hours, which does make the sometimes scary prices a little easier to swallow! continue reading…

Both discs are now changed and this time everything came apart much easier. Also the caliper this side looks to be in much better condition, but both of them will be reconditioned anyway: I don’t like taking chances with brakes.

The cause of the slight play in the bearing also became quite clear when I found I didn’t need a socket to undo the hub nuts – they were quite literally finger-tight despite the lock tab still being in place, so I can only assume that whoever serviced them last didn’t check the bearing preload correctly. Incidentally, Julian Voelcker from Overland Cruisers has posted a very concise and comprehensive how-to on performing this operation on the TLOCUK forums.

Well, I swapped the first disc out last night only to be scuppered at the last step by a bloody seized piston in the caliber! Ho hum – recon kit ordered from Mr. T: hope it’ll be here in time for the weekend…

I’d had a quick look at the front brakes a couple of weeks back, but as the weather’s so nice I decided to take a proper look. Turns out the front discs are not quite the shape that Toyota intended and a bit too thin for my liking, so a new set of discs was ordered from Milners.

Also while performing this inspection I found that the front wheel bearings had a bit of play in them. This isn’t usually a problem as they’re quite substantial taper bearings and usually just need the preload resetting. As such, a couple of new locktabs and nuts as well as a 54mm socket was ordered. You need the socket anyway as the hub has to come apart to get the disc off, so I’ll inspect, repack and reset the bearings at that point.

I’ll stuff another post up as soon as that’s done, and hopefully a video of the procedure too…