I thought about rebuilding mine. But on the one side it was leaking through the seal where the parking brake cable attaches. On the other side the parking brake was starting to seize. Rebuild kit seemed to be boot and o-ring only.

 

I thought about rebuilding mine. But on the one side it was leaking through the seal where the parking brake cable attaches Bon the other side the parking brake was starting to seize. Rebuild kit seemed to be boot and o-ring only.

Yes, most rebuild kits are for the piston seals only. But there are kits for the whole assembly, e.g. this one from Centric at PartsGeek. This particular part is for an older Passat, but I am guessing a similar kit exists for B5/5.5 years.

Replacing the parking brake seal will require some very slim snap ring pliers. I found this tool on Amazon that will reach into the interior of the piston bore deep enough to release the parking brake spindle core.

:wrench:

 

Did the rear's screw out first, then pop out like that? I've been thinking about doing a project like this to start "dusting" off the old look of my 98'.

Forgive me for I'm a bit new at outsourcing to other people, like machine shops and such, but
Where do you get them media blasted?
How much does something like that generally cost?
How much does it cost to rebuild with new seals and such?
Do you plan on painting them on your own, or having someone else do it?
What kind of paint do you plan on using if doing it on your own, an enamel based paint? What color?

 

Did the rear's screw out first, then pop out like that? I've been thinking about doing a project like this to start "dusting" off the old look of my 98'.

AFAIK, they can only "screw" in when they are reset. I tried to screw them out, but they didn't seem to like that, so I looked up the how-to. Turns out the only was to remove the pistons is with hydraulic pressure (pump pedal while caliper is still mounted to brake line) or air pressure (which is what I used).

Forgive me for I'm a bit new at outsourcing to other people, like machine shops and such, but where do you get them media blasted?

I believe machine shops can clean them, and possibly some custom shops will have the right equipment. Because I am probably going to do two or three sets of calipers to cycle through for my own refurbishing and an additional set/s (offered above), I may pick up a canister blaster, which is a media canister that can be attached to you own compressor an will hold abrasive media so you can clean your own parts. A modest size one can be had for about $125 from Harbor Freight, IIRC.

How much does something like that generally cost?

Don't know yet, haven't had a chance to shop them as yet.

How much does it cost to rebuild with new seals and such?

A full set of seals for the rears are about $15. New pin boots are about another $10. A single rebuilt OE Lucas rear is $110 with a $110 core charge (which you get back if you send in your old one).

Do you plan on painting them on your own, or having someone else do it?

I will likely have the set for my own car powder coated, because I hope to track it a bit when I get the SC installed, and I have been told that caliper paint doesn't hold up well to track brake temperatures. I will refinish the set offered above myself using caliper paint, which will hold up well for a daily driver/occasional auto cross setup.

What kind of paint do you plan on using if doing it on your own, an enamel based paint? What color?

I used Rustoleum brand caliper paint in brilliant silver for my current setup, and it has held up like iron. Looks great too. For my new brakes, I am probably going to go with gloss black or brilliant silver again. I want a sleeper, not a loud finish that screams I am setup to go fast and stop faster.

 

Thanks Keith :thumbup: Interesting that they screw in to reset, but don't screw out to be removed

 

Episode II: Baked Dust Menace

When I last posted directly about the caliper rebuilds (not the tool post above but the piston release) I had only completed disassembly as far as I could go without the above snap ring pliers. After removing the rest of the parking brake internals, and after not getting to the machine shop to have them media blasted due to an emergency detour (see MkIV seats in Passat Pickin's thread), I was bored to night so I hit them with degreaser and let them soak for a half an hour and then assaulted them with a variety of wire brush wheels on my drill press, followed by a tiny wire wheel on my Dremel tool for the tight nooks and corners. Really deep corners filled with baked brake dust and road grime I ground out with a ball mill bit on the Dremel. I think I can dunk them in isopropyl alcohol and air dry them, and they are ready to go for color coat. I am now thinking gloss black might be sinister without being overly flashy...

Ugh! They both started out super nasty, with a thick coating of kiln hard brake dust, road grime and other contaminants.

I knocked 95% of the hard stuff off with several passes under a pair of wire brush wheels on my drill press. The more difficult to reach areas required a little Dremel application:

The carriers are letting the side down. I am definitely going to hit them with the color coats too:

And the rebuild seals kits came from Parts Geek yesterday. They are the correct parts for the Lucas rears on the 2004 B5.5. Here's a pic with stock number:

And here's a pic with the package contents:

:wrench:

 

Great job! Those calipers look amazing!:thumbup::thumbup: Personal preference, but I would go clear powder coat on the calipers and a silver to match carriers.

 

I am doing these to match the Porsche Boxter Brembos I have on deck for the fronts which I am leaning towards black for. If I did them in black, I would definitely do the carriers in a contrasting silver, kind of like this (without the decal):

:wrench:

 

Keith, you have the patience of a god. How long did that take you?

They look really good! I wonder if that's how they came from the factory...

 

Keith, you have the patience of a god.

Thanks, I think. IIRC the gods did not have a lot of patience, especially when it came to dealing with pesky mortals. Lots of spite thrown around freely and such. :hmmm:

How long did that take you?

Anything can be rapidly accelerated with the enthusiastic application of power tools. I didn't do it in one sitting, but if I had to replicate the process again (which I will in a couple of weeks when I refinish the second set for sale here in classifieds) I think it can be done in about 2 hours per caliper, including disassembly. It of course helps to have the right tools on your bench, e.g. the compressor to pop the pistons and snap ring pliers to get the parking brake spindles out—the latter of which I did not have, hence the stop-start engagement.

They look really good! I wonder if that's how they came from the factory...

They appear to be sand cast aluminum with machined mating surfaces, so I don't think they were ever burnished to this much refinement. It is certainly growing on me, and now I am leaning to clear powder coating calipers and epoxy painting the carriers gloss black.

I enjoy short projects like this. I can take my time with them because they are not the brakes from my car, but they will go on my car when they are done. As I peruse the offerings of various donor cars in the salvage yards, ideas like this rebuild and refinish pop up when the gettin' is cheap. The used calipers from a 2004 GLX with seemingly pretty low miles cost me $50 for the pair, an easy "yes" of convenience so I don't have to rush trying to refinish the ones on my daily driver overnight to not be without a car.

And to pay for the parts and supplies, I will rebuild and refinish the ones presently on my car in the same fashion and put them up for sale here later this month or in early December, along with similarly rebuilt and refinished fronts.

Thanks for the kudos. I am happy you appreciate the work!

:wrench:

 

Wow nice stuff Kieth! I'm impressed, as usual, by your work!

 

Going to keep the polished look...

Polished and clear powder-coated calipers with black epoxy painted carriers it is. I have just grown to love the polished aluminum look, especially after I hit them once more with a fresh brass wire wheel, the steel wire wheels I had been using were tarnishing them a bit. The brass wire is non-reactive with the aluminum, and the bright that results is stunning white.

So today I heated up the carriers with my heat gun and shot them with a couple of smooth coats of gloss black caliper paint. Once the carriers had cured for an hour or so, I had to test fit the polished calipers on the freshly painted carriers before dropping them off for their beauty finish. Hope to have them powder coated and back later this week. Then I can assemble them for real, with fresh caliper grease on the slide pins and all the new rubber seals in the rebuild kits.

Here's a preview of the caliper and carrier assemblies:

 

Polished aluminum is definitely the way to go with these. Bright aluminum is a great looking metal. Save painting for metals that need to be hidden. Great work & awesome look you've got going.

 

nice balance too!

 

Wow, the calipers look great. Love the work you do to your car, very impressive stuff Keith! :thumbup:

 

just watchout keith, if you build up too much paint on the caliper mount the brake pads wont slide easily and they could get hung up against the rotor and cause issues.

ask me how i know :banghead:

 

just watchout keith, if you build up too much paint on the caliper mount the brake pads wont slide easily and they could get hung up against the rotor and cause issues.

I thought about that, going to remove the paint from the top and inside edges of the tab slides. :wrench:

 

is there a high-temp clear coat available to hit the calipers?

 

For track temps, it seems like clear powder coating is my only option. All the clear coatings I could find locally tapped out at 500°F. The Rustoleum caliper paint taps out at 900°F, but they don't make a clear. VHT has a 900°F clear in gloss or satin but I am wary it will burn off or yellow if I track the Passat at Summit Point in the spring.

I am definitely going to have to powder coat the Porsche fronts when I rebuild them for the same reason. I was OK with using the 900°F Rustoleum on the carriers, because if they burn off, they are a dark iron in color, and they are easily refinished again if that happens. Since I am powder coating the fronts and rears at different times, if I go gloss black for the Brembos in front, I will try to pick a spare set of rear carriers and get them hit with the same color at that time.

:wrench:

 

What I learned today from Gary Lamb, owner of Extreme Powdercoating in Virginia, about 20 minutes from me:

Clear powder coating polished aluminum is seriously not recommended, especially for brake calipers or other parts subject to extreme heat. It addition to adhesion problems, it is prone to yellowing as well. Furthermore, as part of the PC process, aluminum pieces are pre-baked to open the aluminum pores and release all surface contaminants, and then media blasted after to clean these erupted impurities from the finish before applying clear coating. The after-blast amounts to fine grit silica blasting, and leaves the surface with a... wait for it... sand-blasted appearance. :banghead:

So the decision is to leave them naked and they will soon be assaulted by the weather and elements, turning them back over in short order to the drab, grey oxidized aluminum look, or trying the VHT clear coat, following the directions to the letter with an added prep step that would have been done at the PC shop—pre-baking them once to release the surface impurities.

I think I am going to try the latter. I have ordered a rattle can of 900°F VHT Clear Gloss, and will try to sneak them into the lower wall oven in the kitchen one night for a self cleaning cycle. That might be an interesting smell. :devil:

Even if the VHT holds up to daily driver use, it is a lock that they will scorch if I take the Passat to Summit Point in the spring. I say let them look flamed-broiled after. Betty will wear them like a badge of honor. :salute:

BTW, the Porsche Brembos will get gloss black powder coating when I overhaul them net month. No problems with that finish at track temps.

 

There are a bunch of "silver" and metallic colors available in powder coat I wonder if any of those would hold up well at brake temps? Just found the answer "clear is required over metallic colors" so that wouldn't work.

 

I trust this shop (Extreme Powdercoating) in Newington, VA. Gary is on the level. He routinely powder coats tracked calipers with excellent results, but just not with clear.

I am keen to see if heat prepping the aluminum to get the polishes and other impurities out will make the VHT application a success. Unfortunately, the reviews from VHT buyers on amazon are about a 50% fail rate. But I figure at least for daily driving through the winter they should hold up if I do all possible prep work and post-application bake them to set the polymers.

We'll see. I have to get them done so I can swap out my rears this weekend, hopefully. I need to get my winter setup on and that will be part of the swap.

:wrench:

 

Even though it is not glossy finish (it is satin clear), I have decided to have a go with this:

Higher temperature tolerance, and triple the heat curing process steps (30 minutes at 200°F, 30 minutes at 400°F and 30 minutes at 600°F, all separated by 30 minute cooling periods.)

:wrench:

 

So I haven't returned to this thread in a while. I applied the clear coat and reassembled the first of the two rears with new seals, piston boots and spring rings. They look soooo much better, and because I have rebuilt them myself, I have sooo much more confidence in them.

They will be replacing these:

I think these will do the trick with some spiffy EBC RedStuff Ceramic Pads for a little color (and fade-resistant stopping power):

A step-by-step of the rebuild for the other caliper will follow in my next visit to this thread.

:wrench:

 

Lucas Caliper Reassembly

These pictures were taken out of secquence, some of them were shot before I reassembled the first caliper and the then the rest were taken while I was completing the second. I think all the steps are clearly illustrated in photos or described in detail. If you have andy questions, shoot me a PM.

First, collect all your bits and a few supplies. The extras needed besides the refinished/overhaul caliper parts themselves are:

1. Disc Brake Caliper Lube (I used some Permatex Ultra I picked up at AutoZone)
2. Brake Cleaner
3. DOT-4 Brake Fluid
4. 90° Spring Ring Pliers

Get everything together. While I was refinishing the carriers and caliper bodies, I stored my parking brake mechanisms (piston internals) in a jar of DOT-4 to keep them from oxidizing:

As you get started, drop your new parking brake stem seals and piston ring into a shallow container of clean DOT-4:

Inside the caliper body is a registration pin at the very bottom, 6 o'clock position:

The registration pin fits into the hole in the stem end of the piston parking brake mechanism:

Before putting the parking brake mechanism into the caliper body, roll the round o-ring seal from the overhaul kit onto the stem and seat it all the way down:

Install the mechanism into the caliper body, aligning it on the registration pin so the parking brake lever stem sticks out the inboard end. With the parking brake barrel installed and seated fully over the registration pin, slather the stem with a coating of caliper lube and apply the crown shaped rubber seal:

With a Torx driver, fasten the parking brake cable guide to the inboard side of the caliper body so that the narrow tab extends away from the caliper body and the wider tab is pointed towards the caliper body:
[need photo]

Install the parking brake lever over the stem and align it with the angled edge of the cable guide tab. Using a 13mm wrench or socket, tighten the lever to the stem until it seats all the way down and compresses crown shaped rubber seal slightly:
[need photo]

With the parking brake barrel installed and the actuator lever secured, use the 90° spring ring pliers to install the retaining rings inside the caliper body that secures the barrel in place.
[need photo]

With the parking brake barrel now completely secured, it is time to install the piston. Retrieve the piston ring seal from the DOT-4 bath and using your fingers only (no sharp or clamping tools) work the ring into the inner groove of the piston bore:
[photo needed]

Next, install the new piston dust boot. Its a little fiddly, but it will seat nicely in the outer groove of the piston bore:

I need to add a more complete sequence of photos here here to describe the next steps. They are coming, because I have to reasemble caliper 2 because as I am recounting these steps here, I realized I forgot to put in the spring retaining ring that secures the parking brake barrel in the caliper body. :banghead:

I'll describe the next steps with the following notes until I can upload the new sequence pics.

Having the actual Schwaben/VW caliper retractor tool might make this a lot easier, but I have the rent-a-tool from AutoZone. That said, the initial gap between the caliper body outboard prongs and the piston face is far too narrow to fit the tool in properly, so a good measure of steady pressure/force has to be applied while using the retractor tool handle to turn the piston clockwise into the bore. This picture is out of sequence, taken with the piston positioned to twist in, but without the piston boot installed.

Using the tool without the plate that presses against the inner edge of the caliper prongs, you will have to get the the piston about halfway in before the full tool with plate will fit in the gap. Once the plate can be added to the retractor tool, the piston is easily pushed all the way into the bore until it is nearly flush with the caliper body. As the piston approaches this position, the dust boot seal outer ring will slide into the groove on the edge of the piton near the face:
[photo needed]

With the piston seated, the slide pins can be greased and reassembled. First, using the brake cleaner, thoroughly degrease and clean the caliper slide pins and inspect them closely for contaminant wear. I was lucky that mine were perfectly smooth, no grooving or excess wear. If yours are trashed, you can get replacement pins from Centric or Bendix.

Dip the caliper slide pin into the Caliper lube, making sure it is completely coated, but not overly slathered. This amount seemed about right:

Apply the slide pin boot to the caliper carrier to contain the excess lube as the pin is inserted.

Carefully guide the pin into the carrier until the boot seats against the pin head. The pin should now slide smoothly in and out of the caliper carrier socket, albeit with a good deal of suction drawing the pin back in as it is pulled out.

With both pins installed in the carrier, use the bolts in the carrier pins to secure the caliper body to the pins. The slide pin can be kept from spinning with a 15mm spanner while the fastener is tightened with a 13mm.

Oh, hell. Dinner is ready. I'll have to finish my notes later.

Some gratuitous reassembled caliper picture whoring:

Far cry from this:

 

Those came out great! Glad you went with the natural aluminum look.

What wire brush wheels would I need to use to bring the shine back? Is it different in terms of the metals, like brass vs. steel wheels? Also, you mention using a drill press to do this? I've got a grinding wheel (pictured below.) Would this be better to use? Forgive me for I am somewhat inexperienced in the world of sanding and grinding metals. I'd like to rebuild the front calipers on my car this summer, while I've got the front end of my car back in pieces to replace the wheel bearings, but go a step further and clean them up to look as good as these do.

Thanks Keith!

 

Use brass or stainless wheels on aluminum. If you use carbon steel wire brushes, it will stain the surface of the aluminum (which is very porous) with black contaminants.

I use a drill press with my wire wheels so I can hold the work with two hands. If you use a bench vise to hold the caliper, you can use the wire brush in a portable drill (corded) or a small angle grinder. The nice thing about using a drill press is the debris that is removed remains rather localized (spattered on the wall behind the machine) so it is easy to clean up.


Sent from AutoGuide.com App

 

I have this page book marked on my computer and come back to it about every five minutes lol. I'm redoing the ones you picked for me, and the reassembly is getting on my nerves :banghead:

 

Do you have the 90° extended tip spring ring pliers? I found that you cannot get those back in without...

:wrench:

 

Thanks, I'll check that out. I didn't realize I needed such slim pliers so my calipers aren't gonna be finshed till I get them.

 

Finally got the rebuilt right rear on the car:

In my excitement, I cross-threaded the banjo fitting on the left rear and it would not seal. Arghhh! :banghead:

So instead of waiting until Friday which is usually when I can get time to sneak out to the pickin' yard, I just ordered a spare caliper from an eBay recycler for $45. I only need the caliper body, so I didn't mind the rusty looking parking brake mechanics on this one:

It'll be here in a few days, so I'll strip it when it arrives and flash it with a few coats of clear and hopefully complete the swap this coming weekend.

:wrench:

 

Keith,
You might as well hit the rotor hats with a little paint as well. I hated seeing the rusting hat through the wheels, so when I replaced my rotors I painted the hat part of the rotors with Duplicolor ceramic silver caliper paint. It's been holding up very well. Just a thought.
I know I need to polish up my calipers. It's on my list, but first it's time to re-spray my wheels!

 

Those hats look awsome. I have a long festering prblem on my right rear. The wheel shop over-torqued the spacer lugs and they are hopelessly stuck. I am going to have to grind through them from the side one by one, destroying the spacer as I do it in order to remove the spacer and replace the discs with the Meyle Platinum Geomet coated 245x10s I have on my bench. I will do that operation when the rubber is ready for the Porsche cups to be put on, since I have a separate set of spacer/adapters for those.

:wrench:

 

I'm giving this a go with a pair of calipers that came off my car. While wire brushing and messing around with the parking brake lever, I noticed the piston would move outward a bit when I actioned the parking brake lever. So I tried actioning it a bunch of times and Presto the piston came out. I tried this again on the other caliper and it worked on that one too. What's going on is the automatic adjuster is screwing the piston out of the bore a little bit with each lever action.

Harbor Freight gloves $1.47 thankyouverymuch!
Shooting video with the new iPhone. WAY better quality than the old Blackberry.
I put several clips together using the YouTube video editor for the first time. Meh.

The Parts Geek listings show two different Centric kits for the 99 rear calipers with a 5/99 cutoff date. Does anyone know what the difference is?

 

The Parts Geek listings show two different Centric kits for the 99 rear calipers with a 5/99 cutoff date. Does anyone know what the difference is?

After looking through ETKA and other parts vendors' sites, I don't think there is a difference. ETKA only lists two rebuild kits for the rear calipers, one for the 37mm piston calipers found on all Passat models other than the W8 and another for the 42mm piston calipers found on the W8 models. The part numbers are the same for the two different kits on Parts Geek. The pictures posted on their site are actually for a front caliper rebuild kit.

Great video Steve. I never thought I would be able to experience sea sickness on my living room coach though.