Thread: Braking problem?

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Well I have a problem with my truck that I am pretty sure is the brake rotor. What happens is when I am going down the street I let off the steering wheel and apply the brakes really easy where they aren't even barely doing nothing and my steering wheel will start to pull to the right, if I apply them harder or really hard the steering wheel will turn to the right really fast and I don't mean gradually or like a 90 degree angle turn, it will turn pretty fast where say if I wan't to enter the freeway and I have to make a right hand turn (I did this today about 2 hours ago) I will let off the steering wheel apply the brakes and it turns for me. Well my question is, is this because of warpage on the brake rotor? What other possibilities can it be because I can eliminate it being the front brakes because my wheel shakes already because some jackass didn't balance and align my wheels/tires when I got new tires put on so the front already shakes and I know that you can eliminate it being the front if it shakes. I can't tell it shaking anymore when I do that but all I know is that this isn't normal at all and no it's not the alignment because if I let go of the wheel and go down the street the wheel shakes a tad at about 40-45 MPH and it doesn't turn the wheel any, only with brakes on.
Sorry for this being so long but I am just telling you guy's what I am doing to eliminate problems.
Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Sounds like you have a frozen caliper on the left side. Jack it up and spin the left front tire and have someone push the brake pedal to see if it stops turning.

Ok wait, step on the brake and see if the wheel stops turning and if so then that's the prob? I don't get it man sorry. No wait I think I got it backwards... If it DOESN'T stop then that means it is still turning and the piston is stuck or froze up in there? If that is the problem then should I get a rebuild kit or what? Thanks for the help!

Yes, sorry I left that part out. hehe If when you hit the brake and the wheel keeps turning, then you found the problem. It could be that the caliper slides are frozen also. For the price of a rebuilt caliper nowadays, it's hardly worth the time to rebuild it.

Ok thanks a lot Pro, I will try that out tomarrow or Thursday.

i sold parts for about 6 years of my life. i have seen alot of people that had the same problem and it did turn out to be the caliper, but sometimes it was just the hose. so if the caliper ends up acting as though it may be bad, check the hose before you rip that baby off of there. could just be kinked or in a jam of some sort. who knows? just a thought

Most of the time with the problem you describe it turns out to be the brake hose they start coming apart on the inside and create a one way flapper valve, raise it up and have some one push the brake pedal while you spin the front wheels, they should spin free soon as the brake pedal is released, You'll find one hanging up probally the right front, when ya find the one hangin up simply open the bleeder and see if it releases the brake,if it does replace both front brake hoses, if it doesn't replace the calipers, calipers are cheap nowdays so we never rebuild em
and a side note if we replace the calipers it gets new hoses (cheap insurance)

Ok well I tried what you told me to do about the frozen caliper and spining the wheel, etc and both sides worked perfectly. I got to go and try the part where when you release them if they stick or not but I know that the left one does do that and I did both sides a few times and when I had my dad let off I spun the other side and none seemed to be sticking though but maybe I should do it again. I doubt that's it though because like I said neither side had a problem and they seemed to work fine. I also checked to see if any side had any oil or grease and they didn't so that's not it either. I am thinking that the rotor might be warped or something because that's the only thing that I can think of now. Any other suggestions? I would try to eliminate the back brakes but I don't have a emergency brake in the middle where I can pull up on it and drive in reverse a bit to see if that's it. Any more suggestions would be great help. Oh yeah also the hose doesn't have a kink in it and if it did then it wouldn't be doing that.
Thanks.

If pulling to one side, the braking pressure is not equal. For the cost, I would replace both calipers, then you know that they will be equal.....hopefully.

Well the truck only has a littly over 64,000 miles on it or so... I don't even remember what it's got right now but it's around there. Do you think I would already have to replace them? It's a Chevy dually crew cab so it's a pretty big and heavy truck.

Here is a little trick I use to diagnose things like this I use a digital non contact thermometer (but you can use your hand) Drive the Vehicle for a long time using the brakes alot. Then check the temps of all the rotors. Be carefull they should be very hot. If you have a cold one (compared to the other three) then that is the wheel that is not working. If you have a very hot one that is the one that is stuck and draging. If they are all the same then a good look at the steering components may be in order. I am a diesel mechanic so I may be wrong ( I am used to air brakes) but a rotor will usually cause a pulseation not a pull. If after all of thiss you still can't find the problem try just removing the front calipers and cleaning where they slide. this is very common and does not require replacing anything. Just the other day I had to install pressure gauges on all the brake chambers ( remmember I work on air brakes) to check brake balance. This may be something you want to try if all else fails. If my memory serves the master cyl has two circuts. One that controls the left front and the right rear and the other one that controls the other two wheels. if you had two wheels cold and two hot this may be something to look at, remmember the fronts should be much hotter than the rears as they do most of the work. Hope this helps.

Thanks a lot dually. I will try that out and about the master cylinder thing, yes that's true it controls left front right rear and so on. Forgot what that's called again....? But anyway's thanks for the help man I will see what I can do. I will just look at the obvious and work from there.

Make sure you let us know what you find

Well I can't find nothing. Don't know, might just leave it for now and worry about it next week.