Non-Stop Weekend

Well this weekend I stayed at my house to accomplish some major to-do's made the list and started shredding them this morning.

1. Inflate Ford tires
2. Wash Ford
3. Empty stuff
4. Show at 12:00 (guy made an offer)
5. Replace front brake rotors on Toyota
6. Mow the lawn
7. Weedwack

The above have been completed, here is what I have left:

8. Trim bushes
9. Haircut
10. Laundry
11. Bills
12. Finish wiring addition room
-wire in light switch
-install room exhuast fan
-install two wall sconce lights
13. Sheetrock / mud addition room (not sure if I'll get all this done....)

Here are the highlights so far: went down in basement to find 16 inch breaker bar to help me get the caliper brake bolts off, anyways I see a puddle in the corner of the basement, the two connection around the city water meter were leaking, called the town and a guy came and replaced them. One was leather and one was gone! Two fresh rubbers made her dry again.(interesting wording?)

Alright, well I had picked up a couple Brembo rotors on the cheap, some high quality stuff, my Yota had some minor chatter / wheel pulse at high speed braking and I'm not one to let something be wrong for too long, so anyways went at it. The caliper bolts were seized on pretty good, I snapped the male end of a 3/8" 2 inch exension off leaving the nub stuck in the socket! Must have had something to do with the 8ft breaker bar I was using! Levers can make for some super torque! Alas I had a couple back-ups, with my trusty can of PB Blaster (i swear by this stuff, throw out your WD-40! I use PB Blaster for stubborn rusted crap and 100% Silicone for lubing up just about anything, another staple, aerosol white lithium grease in a can! Essentials)
Worked away, well the left front rotor was the learning side, a couple hours to get those bolts loose, I used a vise to compress the pistons, zip tied the caliper to the A-arm (keeps from tweaking the brake lines) popped off the rotor and slid on the new one! I took the oppurtunity to clean the inside of the wheel. I greased the hub and behind where any metal connects, you can see the blue brake specific high temp grease on the surfaces, this makes for easier tire changes and prevents you from having to power slam the wheel off the hub on a highway side tire change, your keeping New England salt from rust seizing your rotors and wheels and hub all together. While every jack will say NEVER USE JACK to SUPPORT vehicle, I just make sure if it gives way there are a stack of wood for something solid to land on instead of crushing your head, hand, or chest under the vehicle. The passenger side was a breeze, it took me about 25 minutes to do the whole thing. Below I attached some pics not in any specific order, the first is the old caliper (the chatter while braking is due to the rotor being out of true, while you can have someone "turn" your rotor, essentially cutting the rotor back to round, it's not worth it. Not only are you taking life off the rotor (removing metal) there is no guaruntee it will be true again, also the removal of metal can sometimes alter the heat dissapation characteristics of the rotor thus warping it back to crap. While generic rotors can be had for $10-$20 each I decide to buy the best, my Brembo's retail for $140 each, I scored them for $55 bucks each. The pads had 90% life left, I just cleaned them with brake cleaner and will run them. So far I've bought 2 rotors $115 with tax, and paid to have my tires re-balanced and rotated $36. Now she rides true without any vibration with nice rotors to last 100k.