Braking Help

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Simon Dean - 04 Oct 2006 21:48 GMT

Rear Caliper, 94, Nissan Primera 2.0 Auto, rear disk brakes.

Handbrake on the rear is controlled with a handbrake cable, but I
understand there's a handbrake lever on the rear caliper with a spring.

I've been trying to grasp the interplay between the foot pedal,
handbrake, and the caliper handbrake lever and piston.

The handbrake lever on the caliper was stiff yesterday. Caused the thing
to seize and my brakes started binding. RAC came out, sprayed some WD40
and poked and prodded at the lever and got it freeing up. This also
miraculously cured the handbrake lever in that there was no longer any
"free play".

Took my car to a garage today, who said the piston was seizing, despite
telling me that it was working free. So I was confused.

I don't want to be ripped off, but I want a safe car.

So er, if the lever was sticking, could that be caused by a seized
piston? If the RAC guy yesterday was able to free up the lever by
spraying it with WD40 and working it, could there still be a problem
with the piston?

I have no idea if they're all interconnected. Obviously if they're
somehow separate, then, Im wasting my money.

Thoughts?

Thanks
Simon

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njmodi - 04 Oct 2006 23:35 GMT

> Rear Caliper, 94, Nissan Primera 2.0 Auto, rear disk brakes.
>
[quoted text clipped - 27 lines]
> Thanks
> Simon

Classic symptoms of a seizing rear caliper piston. Just to double
check, make sure the actual parking brake cable is not binding. Some
of them (like on a 4th Gen Maxima) are routed poorly and can get bent
damaged when the car is put on a lift - cracking the sheathing and
allowing the cable inside to corrode.

More than likely, once that caliper is replaced, your problems will go
away. At the age of your vehicle, it may not be a bad idea to have
both rear calipers replaced as a set - in fact, some people recommend
ALWAYS replacing calipers in pairs (i.e. both rear axles, or both front
axles).

Cheers,
Nirav
96 Max GLE, 138k

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AS - 05 Oct 2006 04:39 GMT

If the lever on the caliper was stuck, then the hand brake lever would
have free play, equivalent to the distance to move the lever from its
released position to the stuck position (simplifying a lil).

Now that the lever is free, I would not do anything to the brakes unless
you notice another problem. Remember that in any case, the front brakes
do most of the work anyways (unless you keep your car loaded).

Good luck.

> Rear Caliper, 94, Nissan Primera 2.0 Auto, rear disk brakes.
>
[quoted text clipped - 27 lines]
> Thanks
> Simon

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