Hate to interrupt your political discussions but I did the front brakes on the Ranger today. I'd taken today off as a recuperation day after spending last week in Las Vegas for work (thats what we call drinking and talking to girls when the bosses ask) and as the weather was decent I figured I ought to tackle it. My records indicate the Akebono's were on there for right around 60,000 miles, in 5 years, which isn't bad considering the rough service the truck has handled. I replaced them with "WearEver" from my local Car Quest. The Akebono's were completely worn out, the driver's side inner was down to metal, the inner almost so.
The passenger side was a bit of a pig, the brake rotor wouldn't come off the hub. I tried heating it with my plumbers torch but that doesn't really have enough heat for the job. In the end I scored the front face carefully cutting around the studs and then cut all the way around to remove that front face. Once I'd cut all the way around a quick rap with the hammer popped the two pieces off. I was VERY relieved when that happened... Then the dust cover had rusted apart around one bolt and was hitting the rotor. Thats a Ford only part and silly expensive for what it is. It'll take a few days so in the meantime I found a washer slightly larger than the rusted part. I ordered the replacement cover but might return it as my quick fix seems good. The driver's side was simplicity itself other than one caliper bolt rounding off, I just pounded the next size down socket on and it came right out. The break in instructions were interesting, it said to take it up to 30mph, then stop, wait 30 seconds and repeat 30 times. "No high speed, no panic stops". After 10 repetitions I got bored, I'll do some more tomorrow. Brake feel is excellent, its interesting how low the pedal gets without your really noticing until you fix it... -Curt _______________________________________ http://www.okiebenz.com To search list archives http://www.okiebenz.com/archive/ To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://mail.okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com All posts are the result of individual contributors and as such, those individuals are responsible for the content of the post. The list owner has no control over the content of the messages of each contributor.
