front brake caliper problem

[sickboy2345]

hi all

I just went through all the posts about changing brake pads etc but there was nothing about problems with brake calipers

what i noticed yesterday was that the nearside front brake pad is touching the disc, after closer investigation i noticed that the piston pushing the left pad is not pulling back all the way and is sticking out , i can push it back a little bit but after i press the brake pedal it stays in the same position....

what could it be? i mean do i need to strip the whole thing down? if so how do i do that? i know there is twoo big nuts to undo to take the caliper down but whats next? and what about brake pads itself? do i just need to take them clips off and slide them out?

and what after i change them do i need to get rid of an air bleed? how do i do that?

sorry for a long post and milion questions but i need to do it today and i\'ve never done it before..

[g11ary]

replied on fduk

[sickboy2345]

thx!

but... in the meantime i hvae done:

taken off both calippers , pulled all pistons out, cleaned them , put some wd40 and pushed them back . then i bled the brakes, starter from the nearside rear,then driver rear,nearside front and driver front.

bleeding:

got the bleeder thingy loose ,had someone pumping brake pedal, waited untill there was no air bubbles (just clean fluid was coming out) and tightened bleeder nipple. done it to all wheels.

tell me what i have done wrong coz i have no brakes now... just wanted to go for a spin to test them but what happened after i pushed my brake pedal was ...nothing...had to pump it few times to make car brake..


what is going on?..(((

[ashc]

after bleeding you have to repressurise so usually takes a few gentle firm presses of the brake to get things going again. Make sure you remembered to put the brake/clutch fluid reservoir lid on again !

[sickboy2345]

done everything and it looks like my brakes are really weak now... not beeing funny but i bled them like 3 times....wtf? :/

[GaseJo]

I think but im not 100% sure that in the bleeding procedure the clutch needs bleeding aswell. I read a feed on it somewhere but cant seem to find it now.

Cheers Garith.

[GaseJo]

Just found the order to bleed them in:-

nearside rear
offside rear
nearside front
clutch
offside front

Hope this helps.

Cheers Garith.

[sickboy2345]

clutch? how do i do that then??

[ashc]

just make sure you dont pump the brake/clutch pedal whilst bleeding the system, it can froth the fluid making it spongy when you brake. Usually, it is a bit spongy for the first few miles then beds in nicely. Also, since it is a shared reservoir, make sure the brake section isn\'t empty - sometimes the clutch fluid is full but because of the divider in the reservoir tank, you can miss that the brake section is a bit low.

[ashc]

clutch bleed screw is near the slave cylinder near the gearbox under the centre of the car