Brake caliper paint or powder coat? Did you split them in half?

I had a really hard time pulling the stuck caliper pistons out. I decided to just seperate the caliper in half so I could get good leverage with my channel lock.

It was extremely simple to separate the caliper in half by removing the five 12mm Allen head bolts and removing the looping brake pipe. Once those 5 bolts are removed, the caliper easily separates in two.

I soaked the stuck piston with penetration oil and slowly rotated the piston with my channel locks. It came out.
 

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2005ViperRam said:
I had a really hard time pulling the stuck caliper pistons out. I decided to just seperate the caliper in half so I could get good leverage with my channel lock.

It was extremely simple to separate the caliper in half by removing the five 12mm Allen head bolts and removing the looping brake pipe. Once those 5 bolts are removed, the caliper easily separates in two.

I soaked the stuck piston with penetration oil and slowly rotated the piston with my channel locks. It came out.
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Was there any trouble and how did you remove the caliper mounting bolts , is access straight forward and easy to get to ... I’ve read they are a bitdit to get out , at least the first time they get removed . Supposedly they are torqued to 9billion foot pounds and loctited in think with red loctite.


The calipers once cleaned up appear decent ! Was that just from soaking in penetrating oil ? They are factory powdered coating it appears !
@Kiwi SRT10 posted about cleaning them getting down under:D and using a wire drill attachment to clean them and polish them when the powder coat got faded .. mine where that was and I was planning on painting mine . I decided to try the SUPER clean degreaser route after watching a detail vid I posted on anther thread . I used a copper steal wool pad and lightly went over the caliper every were I could get to while on the truck . Then I used polishing compound and hand buffed them to shine them up . I did put a coat of REJEX car wax for good measure ( I’m sure that will just evaporate when they heat up ) They turned out surprisingly good for 20 year old calipers ..
The next time I will end up painting them using caliper paint . But probably not till the brakes wear out again or they start the lock up crap again !
So far things have been ok and haven’t had any locking up since I replaced the pads . I did drain out a good amount of brake fluid and making sure the master cylinder did run low . I did the the passenger side first being the furthest away from the master cylinder . Avoided pushing the old fluid and gunk back up into the system when compressing the pistons . Many posts in the past have stated to bleed and change the brake fluid at regular intervals to avoid them from locking up again .. Many just do a rebuild . I’ve also read that the factory brake house due to the clamp used can cause a bleed back problem in the hydraulic line and causing lock up or internal brake hose internal deterioration.
 
I wanted to experiment with cleaning mine.

I cleaned one set by soaking them in Berryman’s carb cleaner (which I had for years). That cleaned them up nicely once I used a toothbrush and rag on the caked on areas.

Since I wanted to clean the chemical off, I took the chemical treated one, and, the other set that had nothing done, to the car wash. I put on their car wash degreaser, then got close with the power wash wand. Not sure why the power wash at the car wash didn’t really do any good. You would have thought the grime would just get washed away.

So I came back home and soaked the other set in Berryman’s. It came out nice, but one again I went to the car wash to get the chemical off.

So all-in-all, pressured water will not do anything. You must use a chemical to get the grease & grime off. If I were to do it again, I would not use Berryman’s only because it now cost $50 for 96oz. That is way too expensive. Again, luckily I already had a can from years ago.

As suggested, I may put some caliper paint on just to add some additional protection. I may even consider a condom. ~lol
 

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2005ViperRam said:
I wanted to experiment with cleaning mine.

I cleaned one set by soaking them in Berryman’s carb cleaner (which I had for years). That cleaned them up nicely once I used a toothbrush and rag on the caked on areas.

Since I wanted to clean the chemical off, I took the chemical treated one, and, the other set that had nothing done, to the car wash. I put on their car wash degreaser, then got close with the power wash wand. Not sure why the power wash at the car wash didn’t really do any good. You would have thought the grime would just get washed away.

So I came back home and soaked the other set in Berryman’s. It came out nice, but one again I went to the car wash to get the chemical off.

So all-in-all, pressured water will not do anything. You must use a chemical to get the grease & grime off. If I were to do it again, I would not use Berryman’s only because it now cost $50 for 96oz. That is way too expensive. Again, luckily I already had a can from years ago.

As suggested, I may put some caliper paint on just to add some additional protection. I may even consider a condom. ~lol
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That’s one dirty caliper hahaha ,, you cleaned them up very nice .. Forget the condom as the QC front caliper population is almost non existent hahaha! caliper genocide should be illegal !
 
VIPR PWR said:
Did you try putting a block between the pistons to get all 4 to move before removing any piston , otherwise you loose the air pressure to blast the pistons across the room with the sound of a shotgun blast haha . How much air pressure was applied ?
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I don’t have an air compressor so that wasn’t an option for me. But I’ve seen videos of them shooting out.
 
Srt10650 said:
I don’t have an air compressor so that wasn’t an option for me. But I’ve seen videos of them shooting out.
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Not having the compressor can make it a chore to get the pistons removed without a doubt ..been there done that .
 
Wifey said:
looks Good

Gotta be careful not to shoot yer eye out!
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I always wear these for protection .. they are actual safety glasses and cost $10 for I think it was a pack of 8 pairs . They did include clear and yellow shooting glasses in the pack also .. I’ve been buying and wearing them for 20 years and even gave some away over the years .. people always ask me what brand thinking they are expensive name branded lol ..IMG_0932.jpeg
 
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Safety glasses are a must! We didn't re-grow our eyeballs!
 
Years ago I bought a pair of Maui Jim’s at around 275$ .. polarized and all hahaha ! An ex girlfriend broke them and ai told her she needs to fix them , she did finally .. then Sandy and here grand children went to a place called Mosi in Tampa the youngest grand child jump up for me to carry him in to the place .. we watched the event and left .. I noticed my sun glasses were gone . Check with the lost and found there and nothing ,, gone for ever . Decided at that point and finding the ones in the pic from Sam’s club that I don’t need no stink expensive sunglasses .
 
VIPR PWR said:
Years ago I bought a pair of Maui Jim’s at around 275$ .. polarized and all hahaha ! An ex girlfriend broke them and ai told her she needs to fix them , she did finally .. then Sandy and here grand children went to a place called Mosi in Tampa the youngest grand child jump up for me to carry him in to the place .. we watched the event and left .. I noticed my sun glasses were gone . Check with the lost and found there and nothing ,, gone for ever . Decided at that point and finding the ones in the pic from Sam’s club that I don’t need no stink expensive sunglasses .
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I am cheap too when it comes to that designer stuff. I find it usually doesn't work any better or last any longer anyways!
 
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