How to keep lube on caliper pins in between services?

[johnnyh55]

Originally Posted by KrisZ
How tight were the pins to remove?
I noticed on my 06 years ago during my annual pon lubrication that the pins on the rear calipers were a bit hard to remove, not stuck, bet there was resistance. It turned out, since the rear calipers are aluminum, oxidation would form under the pin rubber bushings and form a pinch point.
I had to remove the bushings from the calipers, clean out the oxidation, apply caliper grease to prevent oxidation and reinstall. No problems since and still on factory calipers all around.

For those not familiar, first gen Mazda 3s, and I think second gen, use a bushing for caliper pins, not a boot. The pin us partially exposed where it comes out of the bushing and screws in to the bracket. As the pads wear, more of the pins is exposed. Hence, lubricating the pin every once in a while is a good maintenance practice for this type of arrangement.

See that's what I am thinking too, pins are moving but maybe not moving as free as they should be. I removed the bushings last time and cleaned the hole with a file but I am thinking of getting a dremel and grinding or sanding down the hole to clean it up real good.

 

[KrisZ]

Originally Posted by johnnyh55

See that's what I am thinking too, pins are moving but maybe not moving as free as they should be. I removed the bushings last time and cleaned the hole with a file but I am thinking of getting a dremel and grinding or sanding down the hole to clean it up real good.

Yes, this would be the first thing to check. I remember when I did this, there was a lot of oxidation dust falling off as I removed the bushings and the bushings themselves had the imprints where the surface was raised. I think I scraped the big chunks off with a flat head screw driver and finished off with sand paper.

Also, make sure to put on a thin coat of sil glyde before installing the bushings again, it will prevent oxidation in the future.

Also, also

not sure how well you cleaned and how much lube you use on the contact point between the pads and the bracket. I use a small file to make sure the surface is flat and use a wire brush to remove the rust followed by a very small amount of copper anti seize only where I know the pads will make contact. As others suggested, using too much lube in this area may gum things up with dirt and brake dust.

 

[johnnyh55]

Ok so I took the rear brakes apart to have a look and everything seems in check, I cleaned the pad brackets, applied copper anti sieze where the pad rides on the caliper bracket and remove the rubber boots and cleaned the metal in the caliper holes that holds caliper pins but everything seems ok, nothins seized. So I'm not sure why the inner pad is worn down like that, I measured them and the outer pad is at 10mm of linong left and the inner was at 5mm,so half of the outboard pad. I'm not sure what to check. I don't think cheap brake pads wpuld cause the inner to wear faster? If anything I would think they would wear faster but at the same rate.

 

[Railrust]

Well keep in mind, you're dealing with floating caliper designs (90% of us are) and they are far from perfect...some designs better than others, but I find it very common to see uneven pad wear with these calipers. You have one piston right there, the other side requires caliper movement...it just doesn't always happen evenly/perfectly.

There's so many thing that can and will go wrong...are the pads sitting too tight in the caliper mounting brackets? Is the hardware damaged? Is the hardware old/aftermarket/lubed wrong? Are the pads aftermarket? Do the ears need to be bench ground to fit? Are the caliper pins lubed? What about the holes they go into? Are they clean, or is there rust in there? Is there dirt and brake dust in there preventing free movement? What about rust on the caliper mounts? Right where the pads and hardware sits? Just a little bit restrict pad movement. Is the caliper worn? Maybe the pins move too much and the whole caliper twists a bit and causes uneven pad wear. The square cut rubber ring in he caliper bore could be worn and tired...that would cause the inner pad to hang up a bit against the rotor on occasion, causing pad wear. That's pretty common too. What does a rebuilt loaded caliper cost? Might be worth getting one if you're really concerned (and I wouldn't be).

A fixed caliper will have it's own issues too...two pistons and the pins are exposed to the elements. But I do think they have less problems, but then again they are more expensive to make (and the manufacturer sure knows that).

 

[KrisZ]

Since the pads look the same on both sides and each pad looks to be wearing evenly, I'm inclined to say that the calipers and pins are working properly.
This may be the case of pad quality. The inner pads may have a different pad composition than the outer ones. One would expect a harder material on the inner pads, but perhaps they messed that up? Perhaps they were experimenting with something here? Who knows.

I would keep these until the inner pads are worn out and then change them with a different brand.

 

[Yah-Tah-Hey]

Those pads look like they came off of Barney Rubble's mobile.

 

[OilUzer]

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