[Indian2003]

To jack up both rear wheels I place the jack under the tow hook. The jack is a proper Compac and welded together. Not the cheap ones from China made of profiled steel sheets. Spare parts are still available.


Here I am winding in the rear caliper piston with the special tool in a clockwise rotation. On some cars the rotation is anti clockwise.The caliper is a dual action with the handbrake mechanism built in.


Outer brake pad with the 240 grad sandpaper glued on. The next time I will skip the 150 grade and use only the 240 grade.


All the rust is gone after a few days of driving. It actually cleaned up after a few kilometers. Only light braking is needed. I had not planned on posting this so I dont have the before pictures.


This is my wife Elena who does all the heavy work for me. As a former track runner on the national level in Romania, she is extremely fit.


I had fit 4 new Zimmerman brake rotors and pads in September. In December I had a heart attack on the mountains and lost my drivers licence for a month.

The roads are salted and when I came to fetch the car in January, the rear brakes were rusty and the sliders stuck. The rust was just too thick to get off by braking and the discs got some uneven wear patches.

I did not fancy buying new discs so I went jugaad. Skimming was more expensive than buying new rotors so I glued 150 grade sandpaper on to the outer pads with 2 drops of super glue and drove a few days. As you can see the rust is all gone.

Yesterday I glued on a finer 240 grade paper and in a few days of driving the paper will be removed and the pads sanded down flat and fitted.

I think I should have managed with only the 240 grade from the begining. I have 2 more rusty discs which have done only a few thousand kilometers and I will try to clean those with the 240 grade.

I am 72 and when I sit down on the floor I dont feel like getting up again so my wife does all the heavy work for me. Here she is fitting the rear wheels. She took off the wheels and the calipers and I did the rest.

The tools used were a 13 and 15 mm spanner. A caliper piston winding tool and a battery operated impact wrench for the wheel bolts and of course my trusty 45 year old Compac jack.

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the DIY section. Thanks for sharing!

[SideView]

Originally Posted by Indian2003

Outer brake pad with the 240 grad sandpaper glued on. The next time I will skip the 150 grade and use only the 240 grade.

Nice jugaad.

But wouldn't the braking performance be affected with this approach?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Indian2003

To jack up both rear wheels I place the jack under the tow hook. The jack is a proper Compac and welded together. Not the cheap ones from China made of profiled steel sheets.

Good to be using a proper solid jack. But a jack is for jacking up a car, not for holding it up. No matter how solid, you really ought to be using axle stands and block the wheels (putting the car in gear is not sufficient either)

Originally Posted by Indian2003

Here I am winding in the rear caliper piston with the special tool in a clockwise rotation. On some cars the rotation is anti clockwise.The caliper is a dual action with the handbrake mechanism built in.

Very handy tools. You did not mention it, but when you wind in the piston, the level in the brake fluid will rise, to the point where it can overflow. So it is good practice to check before and draw out some.

Originally Posted by Indian2003

This is my wife Elena who does all the heavy work for me. As a former track runner on the national level in Romania, she is extremely fit.

Go Elena, we could all do with such a wife. My wife can’t even open up a peanut butter jar.

Originally Posted by Indian2003

I did not fancy buying new discs so I went jugaad. Skimming was more expensive than buying new rotors so I glued 150 grade sandpaper on to the outer pads with 2 drops of super glue and drove a few days. As you can see the rust is all gone.

In all honesty, cleaning rusty brake and doing something jugaad style is a recipe for disaster if you ask me. Proper working of your brakes is all that stands between you and an accident. Driving around with sand paper glued to the pads is effecting your brake performance. Killing yourself because you want to go Jugaad is one thing, but imagine if you had run over a kid that jumped in front of your car?


I think it is very irresponsible and anti social behaviour.

Originally Posted by Indian2003

The tools used were a 13 and 15 mm spanner. A caliper piston winding tool and a battery operated impact wrench for the wheel bolts and of course my trusty 45 year old Compac jack.

Caliper bolts and lug nuts really ought to be tightened with a proper torque wrench.

Jeroen

[Prowler]

I agree with Jeroen. The extra item will affect your braking performance. Why not try the jugaad of using a angle grinder fitted with emery sheet to skim the rotors ?
In fact I saw one mechanic do the same with a car's rotors. He told me that it saves a trip to the lathe shop and the job is as good for minor imperfections or rust.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Hmmm...

Jacking up a vehicle at the centre line, and supporting with nothing but that jack is crazy dangerous.

I'll leave others' comments to sand on the brake treatment. But skimming is done for disks which have become out of true: I've never heard anybody bother about rust, which is going to happen the instant your disks get wet, or maybe even in humid atmosphere if car is not driven for a few days.

[Bsimhan]

Originally Posted by Prowler

Why not try the jugaad of using a angle grinder fitted with emery sheet to skim the rotors ?

I use this method. Saves the elbow. The only thing is that it has to be evenly sanded. Next time I am thinking that I ought to use the circular wire brush attachment to the angle grinder.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Bsimhan

I use this method. Saves the elbow. The only thing is that it has to be evenly sanded. Next time I am thinking that I ought to use the circular wire brush attachment to the angle grinder.

Those circular wire brushes are very effective at removing rust and won’t damage the surface.

If possible try a brass wire as it is even less likely to scratch the surface. Do wear safety goggles, gloves. Those wires come apart and will bury themselves in any and all exposed skin!

Jeroen

[Bsimhan]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

If possible try a brass wire as it is even less likely to scratch the surface. Jeroen

Thanks Jeroen. Brass was exactly what I was thinking. Cheers.

[Indian2003]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Good to be using a proper solid jack. But a jack is for jacking up a car, not for holding it up. No matter how solid, you really ought to be using axle stands and block the wheels (putting the car in gear is not sufficient either)

I did not use axle stands because I was never underneath the car and no heavy tools were used. The nuts were loosened with a tap of the hand and there was no rocking of the car.
I will not creep underneath the car even with axle stands. If I need to be under the car I will just go over to a friend and lift up the car.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Very handy tools. You did not mention it, but when you wind in the piston, the level in the brake fluid will rise, to the point where it can overflow. So it is good practice to check before and draw out some.

If you looked at my brake pad, they are brand new. I just had to wind in the piston about a millimeter to make space for the sandpaper. No danger of overflowing.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

In all honesty, cleaning rusty brake and doing something jugaad style is a recipe for disaster if you ask me. Proper working of your brakes is all that stands between you and an accident. Driving around with sand paper glued to the pads is effecting your brake performance. Killing yourself because you want to go Jugaad is one thing, but imagine if you had run over a kid that jumped in front of your car?

I don't drive around with the car in traffic. I drive up and down the road where i live far away from people. I have only 5 neighbours where I live.There is no traffic, about 20 or 30 cars pass here. To check it out, I parked on the hill and my handbrake did work on only the inner pads. I am not trying to kill myself or a child.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

I think it is very irresponsible and anti social behaviour.

The environment here is very different from many countries. I live out in the countryside and the road here is used only by about 10 households on a 5 km stretch of roads.I do not find it irresponsible.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Caliper bolts and lug nuts really ought to be tightened with a proper torque wrench.

Not needed for what I am doing now. When I remove the paper I will torque down the bolts. I use an impact wrench with a torque stick of 140Nm for the wheel nuts. After about 100 km I go over again with the torque stick.

Originally Posted by SideView

Nice jugaad.

But wouldn't the braking performance be affected with this approach?

It will if I use the car as normal but I don't. My car has a brake proportioning valve and works 70% front and 30% rear. The rear brakes don't engage with light braking.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Indian2003

• I did not use axle stands because I was never underneath the car and no heavy tools were used.
• I dont drive around with the car in traffic.
• I drive up and down the road where i live far away from people.
• I have only 5 neighbours where I live.There is no traffic, about 20 or 30 cars pass here.
• The environment here is very different from many countries.

Unfortunately, all those lines have been used by people who thought just like you and ended up dead, or at least badly hurt.

Lets look at some sobering statistics, from the USA

The sample data was obtained from a specific group of hospitals. Our Houston jack failure accident lawyers point out that based upon the pattern of incidents, NEISS estimated that 4,822 people in the U.S. receive hospital emergency treatment in a single year for jack failure injuries. That’s almost 5,000 people injured by the simple act of jacking up a vehicle for repair.

Source: https://www.denenapoints.com/u-s-dat...ts-nationwide/

Interestingly some further research showed no women were involved at all. Whether this is due to the fact that women work less on cars, or are just smarter than men remains unknown. But my guess is both and they are often more risk averse.

Look at the injuries, the data suggest that most people were, just like you, not underneath the car, but next to it!

From my own experience: A good friend of mine owns a very nice Mercedes W123 200 Diesel. About 6 weeks ago he was working on the brakes one evening in his garage. He thought the right rear brake was sticking a bit. He put it up on the jack. As per the Mercedes workshop manual you are allowed the lift the rear up with a jack underneath the differential. But he failed to put axle stands underneath it.

Because as he told me afterwards: “I was not going underneath it, I just wanted to have a quick look/feel”.

So my friend is sitting beside his jack up W123, with his hands on and behind the brake caliber. In walks his neighbour, also a hardcore DIY classic car guy. Unfortunately he stumbled over some parts coming in, lost his balance and fell against the W123. It skipped of the jack. My friend was quick, but not quick enough. The car, landed with its right rear disc on my friends hand. This is a car that weighs over 1300kg. My friends hand was pulverised. We are talking meat and bone ground pulverisation! Remarkably, my friend whilst in shock managed to take some images on his iPhone of his hand, before he was carted of to the hospital.

He has lost two fingers completely. To date he can’t use much of his hand and is unlikely to ever regain any use of it. He is also experiencing severe phantom pains of the missing fingers. To boot it all, the W123 was damaged too.

You and my friend made a common, yet very deadly mistake. When thinking about safety you approach it from what is unlikely to happen. Being safe is an attitude, a mind set where you try to minimise any potential mishaps or consequences of possible mishaps.

Almost 5000 people ended up in hospital in the USA alone. 40% related to doing some repair job. You know what, every single one of those guys used similar lines as you just did!

Same with your approach to why it is ok to drive around with sandpaper glued to your brake pads. Something out of the ordinary might happen and then you or others are left to mop up the blood and gore.

I always find it mind boggling when people don’t use axle stand and start arguing why not. You appear to be proud to use a proper very solid jack. A set of axle stands cost a fraction of a good jack and will outlive it by a very large margin!

If you don’t believe me, check out the DIY Car Mechanic Bible: Haynes

https://haynes.com/en-us/tips-tutori...our-car-safely

Enjoy your DIY work on your car, but please be more safety conscious.

Jeroen

[Indian2003]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Unfortunately, all those lines have been used by people who thought just like you and ended up dead, or at least badly hurt.

Lets look at some sobering statistics, from the USA

Houston has a population of 2,3 million people. Norway has a population of 5,5 million. In the last 10 years 9 people have been killed under the car and 5 were badly injured. The police are always involved in case of injury. There will also be cases that have not been recorded where minor injuries did not need treatment at the hospital.

One of my old neighbours used the OEM jack and went underneath the car to replace his exhaust silencer and the car fell down. His head was actually flat but he survived.

Your friend must have done something wrong when placing the jack under the car. He was beside the car working behind the brake caliper and lost 2 fingers underneath the brake disc? Looks like a case where no safety precautions were taken. With this logic, axle stands are needed for changing wheels.

I am familiar with the Haynes manual. I had a few in the 70s. In those days they were written by mechanics who could write. They took you through the whole car dismantling component and repairing. Thoday manuals are written by journalists who think they are mechanics. The show you how to remove the starter motor and tell you to send it to the shop for repairs.

Here is the latest case of a man being killed in August last year. His jack was the kind sold at supermarkets for less than 20 euros.
It just looks like a jack. Lying under the car with that support with wooden blocks was asking for trouble. He was just found dead under the car.
Today, jacks must have TüV approval. This cannot be said of the US.

My jack cost me over a third of my salary. I paid the same as for 820 liters of petrol.

Even my axle stands cost a good chunk of money those days.
In those days Chinese goods were not seen. When they came, the market was flooded with cheap useless junk.

There was another case where a farmer hoisted the front of his car with a tractor and chain and the chain snapped while he was underneath. I dont know if he survived.

We wont agree so we have to agree to disagree. How many cars crash because of sandpaper on the pads and how many crash without? I always keep my distance of at least 3 seconds to the car in front when I drive. At least 5 in snow and more on ice. The last time I did an emergency braking was 4 years ago.
I must note that I am never alone when I have to use the jack.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5UEHWHrCpc

When I replaced my front brakes in September, the old ones had lasted 110,000 km and about 5 mm remained of the old pads. This will give you a rough idea of my driving style and planning.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Indian2003

how cars crash because of sandpaper on the pads g.

You are making the same arguments. Safety is not about convincing yourself why something might not happen. Safety is about ensuring bad things don’t happen.

E.g. most of us will never ever super glue sandpaper to our brake pads. Hence, none of us will ever have an accident due to it.

Stay safe!

Jeroen