Putting On The Brakes . . .

Catching up, this is Saturday’s blog. If you missed Friday’s that I posted earlier this evening, just scroll on down.


Finally this morning, the stars aligned, the sheep entrails were favorable, and the weather cooperated, mostly, so about 10am I was outside and ready to tackle changing out the rear brakes on our truck

After getting all my stuff out and getting the truck jacked up, I had the tire off, and the caliper off. Then after I pulled the old pads, I removed the brake line from the old one,

Truck Rear Brakes Old Caliper

and connected it to the new caliper.

Truck Rear Brakes New Caliper

At this point I got one of the new rotors out and sprayed it down on both sides with brake cleaner to get the shipping oil off and then let it dry for a few minutes.

Truck Rear Brakes Cleaning Rotors

Then after sliding the rotor on the studs,

Truck Rear Brakes Rotor On

I installed the new pads in the caliper and installed on the mounts,

Truck Rear Brakes All Done

and I was done.

It was just a matter of mounting the wheel,

Truck Rear Brakes Wheel On

and tightening it down with my shiny new lug nuts

Truck Rear Brakes New Lugs

At this point it was about 11:45 so I went inside for some hydration and a snack. But before I could go back out and finish the passenger side, it started pouring down rain.

When it finally stopped raining, and the weather radar looked clear, I was back outside about 1:30 to finish up the other side. And as with most jobs like this, the second one went much faster than the first one. So I was finished up, packed up, and back inside by about 2:30.

Before that though, I did a quick test drive around the park to check things out and found the braking much better, but of course spongy since I hadn’t bled the air out yet.

Jan and I will probably do that on Tuesday morning. I need her to pump the brake pedal until we get all the air out of the lines.

And after a job well done, I decided to reward myself, and Jan of course, with dinner at Saltgrass Steakhouse, our local favorite.

Very good as usual.


Thought For The Day:

“Always listen to experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done, and why. Then go ahead and do it.” – Robert Heinlein

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