2001 Camary Back Brake Question

[kappy1]

Hi All
I changed the back pads recenty, you know the swival adjuster arm
that lifts the caliper, after you take the one bolt out. One side is stuck,I cannot sqeeze it open to get the new outside pad in. looks like i need a new one, does this all come as one peice when you buy the caliper, the other side was fine. this one was really hard to swival up also, so I ended
up putting only one new pad on the one side. still had a an 1/8 left on it.
I hope I am explaining this right thanks for any input, Oh by the way this car ws made in Japan, I played it smart and brought my old pad in and looked, and of course they would have gave me the wrong pads, had to drive to another town to get the right ones. dang japenese ha..
sorry also the cylinder in the caliper works fine, just the swival bolt will not
squeeze in to get the new pad on... sorry so long of a discription

[jdmccright]

I may be wrong, but I believe that the "swivel bolt" you refer to is actually one of two slider pins that the caliper slides along to even out the pressure between the inner and outer pads. Removing both of these will allow you to take the whole caliper off and compress the piston cup back into the body (using a C-clamp) to make room for the new, thicker pads.

[kappy1]

JDM,
Thanks for the response
I did not have a problem with pushing the piston in, also there is only one swivel bolt. that is what you compress to fit the new pads, it actually pushes the outside of the caliper open, the question is when you purchase, is it all one piece, I guess I can find that out looking at one, at the auto store
thanks

[solidg]

i think you are talking about the passenger side rear

you need a special tool from sears to get that bolt off

the tool has a handle with a movable head attached

135k le v6 2000

[kappy1]

No It is the driver side rear, both calipers are the same anyway,
maybe I am describing this wrong, there is one bolt you loosen, then the caliper swivals up, now that bolt that it swivals on,, that is bad,
there is no head on it, it is just like a swival pin with a spring I assume.. and you squeeze the bolt with a c clamp,
and the caliper opens up to go over the new thicker pads,, I know you guys
have changed the pads in the back.... I am going to the auto store, and see what they give me when I order one, it has to be all one piece,
thanks for all the help..

maybe you are right solidG about the tool, I will check

kappy

[Mike Gerber]

Have you looked at the generation 4 Toyota factory service manual stickied at the top of this forum. They are available there for free downloading. Download it, go to the rear disc brake section and look at the section on replacing the rear pads. It may help answer your questions.

Mike

[solidg]

I sometime ago did a brake job on my car myself the rear pads
maybe it is the other side i think cause of the design something was in the way and i had to get a special tool and the only place that had it was sears
with there craftsman tools

[jdmccright]

The front and rear calipers are mounted the same way...with two small bolts that thread into the heads of two slide pins that connect to the pad support plates. Removing one and loosening the other will allow you to swing the caliper up to replace the pads. However, the slide pins should be pulled out and inspected for wear. They should slide with only moderate effort. If you remove them and you see a visibly worn or pitted spot, they should be replaced.

I have seen some slider pins with a flat rubber ring attached to the end...including my gen Camry. They can get old, expand, and cause binding. For some reason, Toyota used one slider pin with a rubber ring and one without on each side in my case...the pins without the rubber fit much better. Past auto store replacements were not very good...too small shank diameter and poor surface quality. I'd suggest buying Toyota replacement parts.

[Mike Gerber]

"For some reason, Toyota used one slider pin with a rubber ring and one without on each side in my case...the pins without the rubber fit much better."

Just an FYI. I ran in to this problem recently on my 94 Camry's front brakes. The slide pin with the rubber bushing on the passenger side was binding. Teh bushing was not in it's groove when I pulle it out. I took it apart and relubed it and reinstalled the bushing back in to it's groove on the pin. It really didn't need to be relubed; just to have the rubber bushing relocated back in to it's groove, as the pin was fine and so was the bushing. I then reinserted it in to the mounting bracket and then reinstalled the caliper and retightened it in to the caliper mounting bracket more carefully. This time I used a second wrench to keep the pin from twisting when retightening. I think the twisting causes the rubber bushing to come loose from it's groove and cause the binding. (That's just a hunch on my part.) Now everthing slides freely. I asked a couple of Toyota techs what the purpose of the rubber bushing was. They told me Toyota uses it to suppress noise in the braking system. (Learn something new every day.) One tech also told me that when a car comes in for brake work without the rubber bushing, they don't even bother replacing it. The brake system fuctions fine without it. By the way, the pin with the rubber bushing belongs on the bottom of the caliper mounting bracket.

Mike

[jdmccright]

I just adjusted the brakes on mine as well. I went to the parts store but they don't sell the new pins with the rubber; you have to reuse the old ones. And there is a noticeable amount of slop between the pin diameter and hole.

But found one of my rings was broken (had to fish the pieces out of the hole) and the other was loose and expanded, causing the binding. So I had to go to Toyota @ ~$10 apiece. But the new OEM ones WITH the rubber rings slid in easily and work great...hopefully good for another 200k miles.

[solidg]

I looked at my brakes up on a jack wheels off and the passenger side is the one that you need that swivel head tool

[jdmccright]

Does the swivel tool look like this?

http://content.sears.com/shc/s/p_101...&sbf=Clearance

If so, you can do the same with a C-clamp and a large socket placed inside the piston. But I'm sure it is convenient.