Hi All!

I bought a set of front and rear Akebono pads a couple weeks back and I'm planning on tackling this replacement myself pretty soon -brakes are very squeeky and in need if replacement sooner than later! so any input or guidance on how to do it will be welcome and very much appreciated, thanks in advance! ;-]#

 

Get yourself a manual impact driver. It will truly help with removing the brake rotor securing phillips head bolts. Without it you'll just strip out the heads and an hour brake job (entire D2) will be spent on just removing that one bolt....

After that the rest is pretty simple and straightforward.

 

The screws retaining the rotors are actually Pozidriv, not Phillips.

 

Yes, the screw thru the rotor is a PITA. There are specialized Phillips ratchet heads for that purpose, but a manual impact driver would be better. In the front, I replaced those screws with allen head screws, but in the back I just left them out.


While you have it apart, you may want to sand the center of the hub to remove corrosion and built up crap and make future jobs easier.


Be sure to compress the calipers slowly. Somewhere here there's a thread where a dude destroyed his ABS modulator by compressing the calipers too aggressively. Another option is to crack open the bleed valve as you compress, but that sets you up to have to bleed the brakes when you are done.


The akebonos are great. I just put some on my wife's Armada and now wish I had sprung for them on my Disco.

 

Well I used a #3 Phillips head bit and the manual impact driver and those screws have always come out. I did notice on my 99 that someone tried to be sneaky and replaced the bolts with allen head bolts. I haven't tried to remove them, but that will be interesting one day.

Brake wise still extremely happy with the Brake Motive stuff aka Power Stop. Hardly any dust, zero squeaks, and they stop well.

 

...thank you guys for your tips so far! So next step should be to get the "manual impact driver", already did some research on it and should get this week.

My new question is, this tool will only be needed to loosen the screws that hold the rotors? but do I want or need to get the rotors out to just replace the pads? how to determine if rotors need to be replaced or resurfaced? ...thanks again! ;-]#

 

...thanks Dr. Mordo! ...that "sanding of the hub tip" to get things nicer might be one reason to remove the rotors. As per compressing the calipers, that's something I must do on all four? to get those pistons flushed back in place before refitting, right? and no worries, I'll be gentle compressing. As per bleeding the brakes, I'm comfortable doing it, have done it in the past, in fact have my "DIY Brake Bleed kit" ;-]#

As per the Akebonos, I've read more positive comments than negative, and pricing was right, so choice was easy!

Again, thanks for your feedback!

 

I find Amazon continuously has best pricing on Akebono's. It's a good pad I ran them for years on both my DII's and my Audi's.

EUR676 front & EUR493 rear

Source Harbor Freight for the disc brake pad service kit (link below).

Remember, to pop the top off the master cylinder reservoir while compressing each caliper's piston.

Some disc brake pad service kits require you "use" an old brake pad as a spacer to accomplish compressing both Pistons at once.

One more tip. Inspect each caliper slider pin "bolt" (each caliper has two pins) for resistance. There should be zero to minimum. The calipers should move freely over the slider pins "bolts". If obstructed remove, clean, and gently grease the pins.

Disc Brake Pad and Caliper Service Tool Kit 18 Pc

 

...thanks COORS! ...I did buy them on Amazon, so I must concur with you on "best pricing"! ;-]# ...will also look into your "Service Kit" link from "Harbor Freight", this store has been mentioned a lot lately among my small circle of working friends as a source for tools, in fact, a friend bought me "Torque Wrench from them at an unbelievable low price, and it has worked fine! ...as per your other tips, thanks, will keep them all in mind when sitting down to do the job! ..now I'll just wait for feedback regarding how to evaluate the rotors to determine if re-surfacing or new ones are needed, or if OK to leave them as is. ;-]#

 

I've always been able to just use a C-clamp to compress the pistons, along with one of the old brake pads. The auto parts chain stores have disc brake tool sets in their loaner tool programs so there's probably no need to buy the Harbor Freight set.