Brake Question
Team Owner
Joined: Dec 1999
Posts: 34,873
Likes: 487
From: Lacey WA RVN 68-69
NCM Sinkhole Donor
A pad change is very simple. On the earlier C4, simply remove the upper guide pin bolt and pull the caliper back, pull the old pads and slam in the new ones. Later C4's use a single pin that you remove to do the same thing.
Rear calipers use the same bolt attachment method as the early front calipers. The later C4's parking brake uses the caliper to hold the car, but you do not need to remove the cable to swap pads.
It's always a good idea to turn the rotors when doing a pad change. To remove the rotor, remove the caliper from the bracket and then remove the two large bolts that hold the caliper mounting bracket to the hub. The front bolts are very tight (133 ft-lbs for 84-87 and 166 ft-lbs +/- 15 for the later cars. The rear caliper mounting bracket bolts are 70 ft-lbs.
The caliper mounting bracket bolts can be reused but you need to clean the old locking compound from the threads. I use a wire wheel brush on my grinder. Use BLUE loctite on the threads and torque down. Do NOT use the RED loctite as it needs heat to loosen that material.
Rear calipers use the same bolt attachment method as the early front calipers. The later C4's parking brake uses the caliper to hold the car, but you do not need to remove the cable to swap pads.
It's always a good idea to turn the rotors when doing a pad change. To remove the rotor, remove the caliper from the bracket and then remove the two large bolts that hold the caliper mounting bracket to the hub. The front bolts are very tight (133 ft-lbs for 84-87 and 166 ft-lbs +/- 15 for the later cars. The rear caliper mounting bracket bolts are 70 ft-lbs.
The caliper mounting bracket bolts can be reused but you need to clean the old locking compound from the threads. I use a wire wheel brush on my grinder. Use BLUE loctite on the threads and torque down. Do NOT use the RED loctite as it needs heat to loosen that material.
