How To Diagnose a Seized Brake Caliper
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- Опубліковано 29 чер 2024
- In this Steve's Garage video I cover basic signs and diagnostics of a seized brake caliper. This is a simple video - I'm not removing the wheel and doing any kind of inspection. This video would be great for after you get your car home, or if you're stuck on the side of the road. This video is also for cars driven regularly, not something that has sat rusting in a field for 15 years and now the brakes don't work. This video is specifically about a seized caliper on a 2nd Gen Ford Escape, though most front braking systems and front calipers are very similar across basic cars - We're not talking about performance cars with crazy brakes!
A brake caliper can seize or lock up for a variety of reasons, and there are a variety of signs and symptoms that can point to a bad brake caliper. If you pull the wheel off to inspect your brakes, a set of pads worn more on one side than the other can also point to a bad brake caliper. Excessive brake dust, noise, or the smell of burning brakes can also indicate a seized or stuck brake caliper. Keep in mind that stuck caliper slides can sometimes have similar symptoms as this! If you brake caliper isn't sliding properly on the slides, it can look like a stuck caliper when it is in fact just the slides. The easiest way to rule the slides out would be if the boots are intact and they have ample grease. If the boots are damaged, the slides have bad wear marks, or no grease, it may be ok to just replace the slides and see if the brake caliper is still functional.
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Chapters:
0:00 - Intro
0:18 - Signs of a Seized Brake Caliper to Observe
1:10 - Simple Tests for a Seized Brake Caliper
2:33 - My Experience with a Seized Brake Caliper
3:40 - Outro - Авто та транспорт
What a great video, thank you
Glad you liked it, thanks for the comment!
Excellent, yep Your car will shake too, and in neutral will slow down 😊 .. it be corrosion in the piston as it doesn't return once the pedal is let off, the boots split
Yea, lots of bad stuff. Just need smell-o-vision to convey that burning brake smell since that's the easiest way to tell!
@@StevesGarage definitely, doesn't take long untill it smells when your going 70 mph..😄
@@andyg817😂Thats exactly what happened with this car. We were on the highway, I started smelling brakes, and we puled off to try to limp it home. I called a tow truck and a friend once it started smoking and it was so hot I couldn't touch the wheel.
very informative
Thank you! Glad it helped.
Thanks very helpful
Thanks for the comment, glad it helped!
Thank you!
You're welcome!
You can tell if the car sits for a while and you begin to have rust on your rotors move the car and check the rotors if one of the rotors is still full of rust that caliper is probably seized
That's a good way to check if it's stuck in the retracted/open position!
Does anyone know if you press a little faster or harder on the pedal and you get a quick pull to the left and then pull to the right if that's a caliper issue? If I gradually press down the pedal the breaking is even but if I press on a faster Pace like if someone stopped in front of you I can feel a slight pull to the left and then to the right light they're not in sync.
This could be a stuck caliper, but it could also be a few other things I'd check first. I would start by checking your tire pressure (probably not it, but an easy thing to check and rule out). I assume your alignment is good or it would be pulling when not braking. Check your front end suspension/steering components, but specifically the lower control arms. Bad LCA bushings can cause the car to pull under braking, or "wander" when driving highway speeds. From there I'd dive into the brakes, check for a stick caliper or unevenly worn pads and rotors.
Also brake hose could internal failure effecting flow and debris clog caliper must replace both sides for even brake
This was electorate for me. However, I’m changing my rear driver side brake pads and noticed the rotor will spin when I removed the caliper, but there’s like a “sticky point” where it gets kind of stuck. I tried spraying brake fluid everywhere and that didn’t help lol. Is that normal? Not sure if anyone knows if it could be a rotor also being the issue and not just the caliper piston
So the caliper is off and it's just the rotor spinning on the hub? Do you have an emergency brake that has shoes inside the rear rotor? That's the first thing I'd look at if the rotor feels like it's grabbing when nothing else is on.
I took my vehicle, also a ford escape, to the shop to get brake work done. They replaced the front rotors, pads, and rear drums. They flushed the brake system and bled it. The brake pedal is STILL soft and spongey. Why is this?
A spongy pedal after all that work makes me think there's still air in the brake lines. I've had some cars take a while to bleed, and the only reason I kept doing it was pedal feel. You could even do it yourself if you're comfortable doing so. It's not a bad job and gives you piece of mind it was done correctly.
@@StevesGarage I was told to wait a couple days so if it doesn’t get better, I’ll go back. They charged me an arm and a leg to get all that done. Thanks for timely reply!!
@@AzinStaysIntact Not a bad idea to give it a couple days to let the brakes bed, but in my experience I don't get that much of a different pedal. You paid for a service, you're not wrong in wanting it done correctly!
Could it unseize and seize every now and then I believe I might have this problem because when I drive on the highway every now and then my car will vibrate in the rear and then sometimes it won’t vibrate at all could this be because of a seized caliper ?
Today I got home and the wheel was boiling hot i couldn’t even touch the rim
@@franciscoperez8704 That sounds like it could be a caliper. Does it smell at all? Burning brakes has a very unique smell. It is possible for the caliper to free itself. On the car in the video the caliper actually worked fine once the car cooled down, but if it's locking up like that it should be swapped out.
@@StevesGarage yes it did smell and I basically wasn’t able to touch the rim at all and was a bit confused since usually all the braking goes towards the front
@@franciscoperez8704 You're correct, the bias is towards the front. But it does sound like that rear caliper is locked up. I'd take care of it asap just because the longer you let it go the more damage it could cause.
@@StevesGarage will do already ordered a new caliper thanks for the replies back
Can they get stuck temporarily & then go back to normal?
They can. Even in the case of this car once it cooled down it functioned normally again. But if it gets stuck, it needs to be replaced as soon as possible.
I have a infared thermometer sitting in my glove box😅
Can never be too prepared!
Why not jack up car and see if wheel spins freely?
That's the simplest and easiest check, but it may not result in a correct diagnosis. In the case of this video, I was driving when it locked up on me, so I'm referencing signs you can use while you're not home around a jack. I've also seen sticking calipers be intermittent, so you might check it and it's fine, but then you drive and it shows symptoms of locking up.
Additionally, this car had no signs of a sticking caliper before or after the drive. Prior to it locking up it was totally fine, and once I let the car cool down it was working fine again. It just so happened that it locked up so badly I had no choice but to tow it home.
@@StevesGarage had my rear left changed apr22. Heard scraping last week as drove off. Rear left disc v hot after short drive, rest barely lukewarm. Went back to garage as 2 year warranty. But they reckoned brake hose. Changed that and brake pipe as rusted on and damaged pipe removing it. Got it back. Think same issue. Jacked up that side, wheel barely spin and wants to stop and scraping noise. Jack up other side, spins fine, no scraping noise. Drive...was v hot again vs rest one way. But let it cool off. Then drive back. Wasnt that warm vs rest after return trip. Confused alright.
@@echoecho5244 It's possible that if the hose was damaged and the hardline rusted that some debris is now in your new caliper causing it to not operate correctly. Since it happened intermittently on your last drive, it could also be that that caliper needs to be bled again. You could have air in the system. In any event, I'd take it back to that shop if you have a warranty.
@@StevesGarage thats interesting
It prob would invalidate the caliper warranty if failed because of other connecting parts. Just want it fixed really. I did another short test drive with same results and same result when jacked it up and tried to spin the wheel. Car back at garage now! Thanks for your help!
@@echoecho5244 Hopefully it gets sorted! I generally replace the hose with the caliper just because I'm there. Luckily I haven't needed to replace hard lines yet. Let me know how it goes and if they end up finding the problem!
I drove mine for 15 km and it heated up and was smoking. I threw water on it and it cracked up the rust and broke evert free. I wouldn't recommend it lol
Yea I wouldn't recommend throwing water on any hot part of a car. That can usually cause more harm than good.