I was hoping to clean up the caliper, grease the pins, and not replace. Honestly don't know anything about the methods of bleeding brakes. I hadn't noticed any vibrations. I had some pretty bad brakes on my previa last year. That was my first brake job done by me (always seem to have to wait a week to get an appt at my mechanic). I left the rotors even tho they were pretty gnarly and I could feel the pulsation. Anyways, hadn't felt that here. Nevertheless, by not visiting the mechanic I am saving so much labor I may as well do the rotors. Napa rotors ok? If I do one side, I'll probably do the other rotor too. What's this about E-brake (assuming that's a parking brake) on the sienna?
Think the Caliper is Stuck
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There's some friction without the pads, but thought that was normal. Don't know anything about e-brakes or parking brakes.
I used Autozone rotors (for the fronts), as they seemed to have the best reviews (here) vs. dealer-sourced rotors. The parking/e-brake is a drum brake system (with brake shoes instead of pads) which lives inside the center portion of the rotor. It's cable-driven. I believe they have a star-wheel adjuster which needs to be backed off in order to be able to pull the rotor off without risk of damage to the parking brake hardware. Otherwise, the shoes typically catch on a wear grove and you pull and pull until something breaks.
Ok , every brake job video I watched did not mention the e-brake or p-brake. There rotors just slide right off! So a) is this ebrake on both rear wheels, or just one side (which side?) and b) how do I access this "star wheel" adjuster? Or will it be obvious when I start looking?
I see this as I google around, but the image isn't ringing bells. This off tsienna.net on parking brake replacement. Ok, more googling. I'm gathering that I pull the rubber seal on the rotor and I will see the "gear" for adjustment. Going into the garage to find out.
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Yup, see it, but no matter the rotor slid right off. What I am finding is that the piston is stuck in the nearly wide open position. About an 1/8th of it shows. Can't compress any more with clamp.
Mound, for a better understanding of the rear drum brakes operation and setup take a look at this video. Did you remove the drums then apply brakes? If you did then the pistons will come out at both ends of the slave cylinder , and you never want to do that! Is there brake fluid coming out ? In the video you can see the person moving the the brake shoes and the pistons moving freely left and right. Well you can't really see the pistons in the cylinder but they are moving. Yours do not move like this? Also there isn't a separate section of the drum which serves as the e/p brakes. If this were the case there would be separate shoes. I have never seen a setup like this however. My Volvo has disc brakes in the rear with a drum section for e brakes . Anyhow the same shoes for regular rear brakes in our Sienna is also used for e/p brakes . This is how it is on my 06. Supposedly, when brakes are applied in reverse the rear drum brakes automatically adjust. The adjustment wheel is useful not only to "micro" adjust if needed but when there is a shoe or drum replacement . Adjusting the wheel appropriately will help to set the shoes close to the inside surface of the brake drum surface. If you are not comfortable nor understand how brakes are put together and operate then it is best to leave it to the pros.
Hey thanks. Unfortunately, mine is disc brakes, not drum. I pressed the brake pedal but the piston on the caliper didn't move a bit.
Ok , sorry about that. Guess I missed that . See what happens if you loosen the bleed screw on the caliper and try compressing. Some brake fuid may or may not come out so be prepared for that.
If your caliper is stuck extended out, then it is, in fact, seized. I would be ordering a new Toyota caliper from the dealer, although a different name-brand part might be ok. The rebuild option will have you unsticking and removing the piston, honing the walls, and reassembling.
Yeah, that is probably out of the question. The piston appears all the way "in" which I presume means not applying pressure to the pads. I will need my car soon, so will be getting parts. Any tips on bleeding brakes? Never done, never wanted to
Didn't try that -what's the reasoning there? An air lock?
As I mentioned earlier I had one occasion where the brake line internally collapsed. It would not let the fluid return and would "lock" up the caliper piston. The logic here is if it is still locked after loosening the bleeder the caliper is the problem, if it suddenly starts to move the rubber brake line is too blame.
The odds of this are very low but if the line is too blame a new caliper will not improve your situation.
A healthy caliper should move reasonably easy with a c clamp to collapse it.
The odds of this are very low but if the line is too blame a new caliper will not improve your situation.
A healthy caliper should move reasonably easy with a c clamp to collapse it.
I guess the issue is that the piston is in the nearly all in position, meaning there is only about 1/8th piston sticking proud of the caliper housing. This should mean that it is stuck open, i.e. no pressure on the pads. Now, should it be able to be compressed even further inward (open)? I do not know. But, I can try the bleeder and see what happens on Sunday. Work, unfortunately intervenes in the progress. When I open the bleeder, would the piston "relax," or extend out -i.e. move toward the pads to clamp onto the rotor?
I should take a picture. Honestly, don't know what happened as the piston seems stuck open but there was burning going on (and not from the parking brake from what I see). The pads are still thick, but are softer than they ought to be, a strange brick color under the metallic-looking surface material, and the corners are worn. They were properly seated in the caliper. This pic is the front of the rotor. I've seen worse. Those rings of saturn are not deep grooves.
I should add when I bought the van from a dealer in 10/21 at 80K, the dealer said all the brakes were good. They felt perfect until two weeks ago. The van now has 103K on it -majority highway miles driving to SW, FL, NY from MN
Ok I am so confused😂? The piston is pushed into the caliper all but an 1/8 of an inch? If so that is correct. If you push on the brake pedal, have someone else do it slowly while you watch, does the piston move (push out)? If so that is also what it's supposed to do. If not the caliper would need to be replaced. I wouldn't open that bleeder until you know for sure the piston is not moving because then you Have to bleed them and when they're that old they could break. Just remember PB Blaster is your friend🤣. I've had Toyotas for the last 25 years or so and they are notorious for having the slide pins stick so the caliper can't float like it should causing it to seize the pads up. The first thing I would do after testing the piston, as long as it is working, is replace the pin and boots, use a drill about the size of the pin to ream out where the pin goes in, spray it with brake cleaner, grease the new pins, put on the new boots, and put it bake together with new pads and probably rotors too. Hope this helps and keep us posted.
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