HELP! caliper dragging on rotor.

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1998_K1500_Sub

1998_K1500_Sub

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sethturbo said:
same thing those went in for cores as well, which brings me to give you even more detail, i did my rotors and pads in february new rotors new pads did the change at one point after the change my front left brake started smoking at a light after stopping, after that it didn’t do it again, it was right after i chanced them so i figured it was just oil dripped on them or something or a film was burning off even thought i sprayed them with brake clean. so back to yesterday when i am taking off my pads rotors calipers, so my driver rotor has a fat divot towards the outside of the rotor but still on the braking surface. and my pad is like i said basically metal on metal, my inside pad for my driver side had significantly more wear then the passenger side. I can go get another caliper and trying it out as it’s relatively cheap (45$) but i don’t wanna spend money and install something only for it to be the steering knuckle is bent or something else
Click to expand...

The fact you've had two odd outcomes with the driver's side brake, in a relatively short time (Feb this year for the prior rebuild, yes, and now you're doing it again), makes me think there's something else in play here.

@Supercharged111, do you have any ideas here?

Could the knuckle be damaged?

Is the hub bearing worn / WAY out of spec?

@sethturbo, if you remove the caliper and put the lugnuts on to affix the rotor to the hub, can you rock the rotor back / forth, up / down at all? This would be indicative of excessive play / wear in the hub bearings. Rotate the rotor by hand; does it turn smoothly? Are there any odd sounds?
 
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1998_K1500_Sub said:
The fact you've had two odd outcomes with the driver's side brake, in a relatively short time (Feb this year for the prior rebuild, yes, and now you're doing it again), makes me think there's something else in play here.

@Supercharged111, do you have any ideas here?

Could the knuckle be damaged?

Is the hub bearing worn / WAY out of spec?
Click to expand...
well, my steering has play somewhere in the joints and it causes the front wheels to kind of fight each other sometimes where one wheel wants to go straight and the. other is wobbling a bit aided to say causing the truck to almost feel like it’s hopping on my front left wheel, also if you couldn’t see in the pics i don’t have my cvs in place
 
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sethturbo

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1998_K1500_Sub said:
The fact you've had two odd outcomes with the driver's side brake, in a relatively short time (Feb this year for the prior rebuild, yes, and now you're doing it again), makes me think there's something else in play here.

@Supercharged111, do you have any ideas here?

Could the knuckle be damaged?

Is the hub bearing worn / WAY out of spec?

@sethturbo, if you remove the caliper and put the lugnuts on to affix the rotor to the hub, can you rock the rotor back / forth, up / down at all? This would be indicative of excessive play / wear in the hub bearings.
Click to expand...
as to the bearing question the bearing feels fine there is what feels to be no play in the bearing, and when i took the cvs out i left the axel stubs in so that’s not missing btw
 
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there is a slight amount of resistance when just moving the rotor with no caliper attached but nothing crazy no grinding noises nothing
 
1998_K1500_Sub

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Well, you can determine if it's the caliper by running the test I mentioned earlier (remove the suspect caliper and try simply fitting it on the other side). It's messy, disconnecting the brake line and such (and you may need new copper washers to get it to seal), but it's one sure way to tell.

I know you've already swapped the rotors, so it seems you're "OK" there.

Otherwise, there must be a dimensional issue with the knuckle or the hub / bearing... one of them is out of spec.

That's my story, for now.

:think:
 
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1998_K1500_Sub said:
Well, you can determine if it's the caliper by running the test I mentioned earlier (remove the suspect caliper and try simply fitting it on the other side). It's messy, disconnecting the brake line and such (and you may need new copper washers to get it to seal), but it's one sure way to tell.

I know you've already swapped the rotors, so it seems you're "OK" there.

Otherwise, there must be a dimensional issue with the knuckle or the hub / bearing... one of them is out of spec.

That's my story, for now.

:think:
Click to expand...
i’ll report back tommorow with updates, im gonna just grab another caliper and dry fit it right out of the box and ill go to oriellys or advanced this time
 
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1998_K1500_Sub said:
The fact you've had two odd outcomes with the driver's side brake, in a relatively short time (Feb this year for the prior rebuild, yes, and now you're doing it again), makes me think there's something else in play here.

@Supercharged111, do you have any ideas here?

Could the knuckle be damaged?

Is the hub bearing worn / WAY out of spec?

@sethturbo, if you remove the caliper and put the lugnuts on to affix the rotor to the hub, can you rock the rotor back / forth, up / down at all? This would be indicative of excessive play / wear in the hub bearings. Rotate the rotor by hand; does it turn smoothly? Are there any odd sounds?
Click to expand...

He said 2 different rotors had the same result, but the other side is OK. And the driver's side was screwy before the brake job. And this is a reman caliper, so presumably GM. How long have you had the truck OP? Was it ever right? If not, I'd become suspicious of a knuckle being bent somehow.
 
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I had a driver's side front caliper dragging problem that almost caused a bad wreck. I always clean out and grease the slider bolts but for whatever reason one filled up with baked on junk and froze up. The problem wasn't apparent until the brakes got hot on the freeway. Most of my driving is short trips and they barely heat up.

Remove the bolts and check the smooth surface for damage or baked on contamination. Polish them clean if so or replace them. Blast out the rubber boots they ride in with brake cleaner. Put a light coat of grease on the smooth surface and push them through the boots. Clean the threads, apply a dap of antiseize.
 
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