6G Celicas Forums

I changed my pads a few years ago and I just started hearing the wear sensor squeel. I only drive about 5000mi a year so I took the tire off to see what was up. Only one pad is worn down and the rest are still new. My question is, do I just need to bleed the brakes or is there more that I'm not seeing here? If I just need to bleed, do I bleed the three that aren't stopping or the one that is?

Thanks,

Don

Sounds like you could possibly have an issue with the calipers on the side that is worn down. Could also possibly be an ABS issue, but I think that's less likely.

Is there evidence of high heat on the side that's worn down? You'd know by inspecting the rotor; it'll have some lovely colors on it, like burnishing colors (purples, greens, pinks) if it's been exposed to high heat. This could also be an indication of a problem with the calipers. Also, are your brakes pulsating when you brake, or do they brake smoothly?

Well, while taking the caliper bolt off, it broke in the caliper bracket so now I'm royally facked. I'm going to try and drill it out and tap a slightly bigger bolt but I'm not sure how well that will work. I do have a little sign of a heat problem. Not on the rotor but on the old pads. They were cracked and pitted but they are organic pads so I wasn't expecting much from them in the first place. Time to go find a caliper bracket. If anyone has one laying around...that would be awesome!!


EDIT: Nevermind about that bracket...it is only $40 from the dealership so instead of worrying about shipping and waiting the week for it to get here, it will be there tomorrow at the dealership.

Now I just have to find out why the pad is wearing more than the others. While on hold waiting for the parts department, I was thinking. Based on my aircraft technology background, logic would tell me that I possibly have air in the three brakes that aren't wearing as much and instead of the fluid extending the calipers, the air is compressing and the one line without air (right rear) is stopping the majority of the weight. Thus the hotter brake pads and the faster wearing. Does that sound possible?

This post has been edited by airforceb2cc: May 6, 2008 - 1:16 PM

I think it sounds unlikely that you'd have air in three of the brake lines and not all four. Just seems odd. But anything is possible I guess; try bleeding all the lines and see if there's any improvement.

Is it a rear brake that's squealing? I'm wondering if the brakes are out of adjustment? This is just based on my past experience with brakes, but on other cars, not on a Celica. Worth looking into I think though.

Something is probably frozen, either the caliper piston or slide pins.

Air isn't going to cause more/less wear, it will simply cause very soft brakes.

If you do have a frozen caliper, which seems likely -- my guess is that the worn pad was on the piston side -- and a bolt broken off in the bracket, I'd suggest replacing with a semi-loaded caliper. This will be a rebuilt with the bracket included, as opposed to an unloaded caliper (no bracket) or fully loaded (caliper, bracket and pads).

I got the new bracket in today and installed. I'm going to drive a week getting on the brakes pretty heavy (I usually downshift and hit the brakes around 10MPH) and see how the wear pattern looks. The caliper piston looked fine and wasn't cocked at all. Both pads were worn but the piston side was wearing at an angle so that leads me to believe I have a caliper problem. I'm also going to bleed the brakes this weekend. I have half a gallon of brake fluid laying around so I figured it wont hurt anything to do it...as long as the bleed ports aren't fused to the caliper.

Wow. DeJaVu. I was replacing my pads the day before yesterday and had a bolt snap off in the caliper bracket. Wasted a couple hours trying to fix it before I looked it up and found it was only a $40 part. Needless to say I had mine ordered and is ready to be picked up at the local toyota dealer...

Don't forget the anti-seize compound on the threads!

I wasn't going to put that on there because I've seen caliper bolts come off before. Granted you should be checking them every time you rotate your tires so they shouldn't migrate that far without being cought but yeah. I didn't put any on...I'll just back them out every now and then and clean them up every once in a while.

If the bolts are tourqed to spec it doesn't matter.

Very true...I'll be taking them off again soon to check the wear so I'll throw some on at that time. I doubt they will seize in a week or two. Thanks.