Date: Thu, 14 Oct 2004 16:16:40 -0700
Reply-To: Craig Oda <craigoda@GMAIL.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Craig Oda <craigoda@GMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Further Q's: Brake noise damping plate
In-Reply-To: <20041014223544.93064.qmail@web11207.mail.yahoo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Michael,
I ordered a set of noise-dampening plates along with a couple of sets
of caliper rebuild kits from VolksCafe. Note that they don't normally
sell these and are doing me a bit of a favor. I think that the dealer
is charging them 5 or $6 and they are passing the cost on to me.
Very friendly, nice people there.
It's kind of a hassle for me to go down to the VW dealer, so I like to
order stuff through one of the nice vendors (VolksCafe is local to me,
Vanagain, BusDepot, GoWesty are also good known vendors, but further
for me). However, you may want to deal with the VW dealer. For me,
I like the friendly service I get from non-dealer vendors and I get to
"talk vanagon"
I have Teves calipers too. After I took off the caliper and cleaned
it out with carb cleaner, the squealing stopped. Since I just ordered
the noise damping plates and seal kit, I have not installed them yet.
My squealing stopped when just an exterior cleaning of the caliper and
a good bleeding. Maybe yours will too? I still plan to rebuild the
calipers at my leisure.
Here is what I did:
- took caliper off of vehicle and put it in a plastic bin
- shot a whole bunch of carb cleaner over everything several times.
Used a small metal tool to pick out pieces of dirt and old anti
brake-squeal goop.
- used a rag to really clean the rust away from the inside of the piston.
- sprayed pads and rotor with brake cleaner
- Sanded and lightly polished the pins that go through the brake
pads and then greased them lightly with standard lithium grease. (I
was thinking that maybe they were preventing proper pad movement
evenly). Not sure if the grease will cause problems.
- bolted everything back on
I was thinking that I would just drive it over the weekend, put up
with the squealing and then change change the seals and install new
damping plates next week. I primarily took off the piston to give a
good check of the brake lines, rotor, and caliper. I didn't expect
the exterior cleaning to solve the problem. However, it did. For
now. I was planning to give a report to the list after a week to see
if this really solved the problem. I installed the caliper last night
and then took my orange Westy for a 30 minute test drive up and down a
curvy mountain road and heavily used the brakes. I also drove the van
to work today and tried all types of stopping - slow, fast, abrupt.
So far, so good. However, you know how these things are. Problem may
rise up again today or tomorrow. Anyway, since you are in the same
situation as me, thought I would share my info now, then report back
to the list later on the situation.
-- Craig
On Thu, 14 Oct 2004 15:35:44 -0700, Michael Rule <manikmike@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Ok, so if I am reasonably sure I have Teves/funky 1/3dia-recessed-area pistons in my calipers; and am definitely missing anything resembling a "noise-dampening plate"; and the squeaking is driving me (more?) batty--
>
> Can the dampening plates be obtained separately (at this point I'm happy to be dealer-gouged to stop the consistent super-mouse-squeak as nothing else has worked), or are they standard with dealer/List vendor/OEM (whatever brand that may be) brakepads??
>
> The pads on there have plenty of life, but I'll replace them in 2 shakes of a squeaky mouse's whiskers if it keeps them quiet (the pads, not the mice).
> Cheers,
> Mike
>
>
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