Front brakes dragging

42428 Views 44 Replies 20 Participants Last post by andyvh1959, 5 mo ago

Mas

Discussion Starter · May 4, 2009

2001 Dak 4.7 4x4 SLT: I smoked my front driver's side brake with short city driving. It heated up to the point that I could smell it and pulled very hard to the left. This happened to me a year ago, but that time both fronts smoked! I let them cool, and they were fine since.

The previous owner also had brake issues and the dealer replaced rotors, calipers, and pads...seems to be another issue to be happening. Obviously the calipers are not releasing. Would the booster cause this problem?

MAS

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70Cuda383

· #17 · Apr 25, 2011

DanaRocque said:
How long does it take for the new pads to "Bed" to the new rotors? Im wondering if this is normal break-in?

100-200 miles. no more.

I felt like mine were taking a little too long, so I flushed out all the brake fluid, pulled the calipers back off, pulled the slider pins out and sanded them down some to clean them up, knock off the crud, put fresh axle grease on the pins, and a light coat of grease where the pads slide back and forth on the bracket, and reassembled everything. no more dragging or hot brake smell after a short drive.

I tried to be lazy, knowing that I probably SHOULD have done all that when I swapped out the pads. I ended up having to tear it all apart and spend another 2 hours re-doing my work!:jester:

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70Cuda383

· #22 · Apr 26, 2011

Mas said:
Well to follow up my original post. I replaced rotors, calipers, pads, flex lines, bled the system, and used the little tube of goo for the pads/calipers over a year ago. I wanted to start fresh so I replaced most everything. To date, I have not had any problems with my brakes...except maybe once when I was towing a trailer & braking downhill. I smelled brakes & let up....no further issues.

I basically believed the brakes are engineered poorly and a re insufficient in size for the truck...add a trailer and a hot summer day and you've got trouble.

I did replace the pads with a "heavy duty" fleet service pad with a lot of metal in the pads to dissipate heat. The downfall is a lot of brake dust on my wheels. Maybe that is the trade-off??

Mas

um...yea, that's not brake pad bed-in, that's overheated brakes! loaded trailer? down hill? trailer have brakes? next time downshift, and work the brakes less.

as mentioned, these are not heavy duty trucks, so they do not have heavy duty brakes. they're good for about 1 or 2 panic stops, and that's it. good news is, 98% of these trucks are just daily drivers and never get modded or worked hard, and the brakes are adequate for that. anyone who is going to really work the truck...will go buy a full size work truck! the rest of us...we're just speed junkies and you need good brakes when you make big hp!

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70Cuda383

· #24 · Apr 26, 2011

yes, every one of these trucks has RWAL because the light ass end of a truck makes it very easy to lock up. if they made the brakes so small that it wouldn't lock up when you're empty, then you wouldn't have enough brake power when you have cargo.

6 lugs? don't know why they did that to these trucks. it definitely is NOT because they are a heavy duty work truck!! the Dakota is a medium duty truck, it has 6 lug axles. the Ram is a full size heavy duty truck, and it has 5 lug rims.

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70Cuda383

· #26 · Apr 27, 2011

Craigslue said:
They may not be a heavy duty work trucks but they aren't much smaller than the full size trucks of a few decades ago. The new full sized trucks have gotten huge in the last decade.

yup....and compare the brakes on those trucks of a few decades ago....

all wheel drum brakes without any form of anti-lock...makes these Dakota's look like a freaggin ferrari!! :jester:

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