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Hello! I have had an issue for a number of years with my car, and I’m at my wits end from trying to get it finally figured out. If anyone here is able to offer any diagnostic advice, it would be much appreciated.
Let me start with my car: It is a 1998 Honda Civic EX, manual transmission, non-ABS model.
So, a number of years ago, my right front wheel bearing went bad and I replaced it with my dad, who is much more experienced than myself when it comes to auto repair, and he has a much more extensive set of tools, including a press, which was necessary for the wheel bearing replacement, since they are pressed-in bearings. Ever since we replaced it circa 2011, I have had issues with the right front rotor warping. I know that it is the right front because replacement of that rotor does temporarily eliminate the brake pedal and steering wheel pulsations while braking for about a month. I’m on what must be my second or third replacement rotor.
When I went to replace the rotor for the second time, I knew there must be some underlying problem causing it to warp again after the first rotor replacement. Thinking it may have been a sticking caliper causing overheating and/or possible brake pad material transfer, I pulled out my infrared thermometer one day and checked the rotor temps on both front rotors right after getting off the interstate. I did this a while ago, so I don’t recall the exact temps, but I remember them being maybe 10-15 degrees apart, with the right front being the hotter. With that in mind and the fact that the front right caliper, while not seized, did seem somewhat more difficult to retract than it perhaps should’ve been, I decided to replace the right front caliper with a Honda remanufactured unit and a new rotor and brake pads. All parts were OEM. One month later, the problem came back. :pinch:
And here I am now, not sure how to proceed to determine the cause of the repeated rotor runout. Since my rotor has warped for the third time, I decided to try the test that ETCG made a video on for testing for a brake line failure, causing calipers to stick. I had a friend pump the brakes up for me, as Eric suggests you do in his video and, after my friend released the pedal after the last pump, I opened the bleeder and all I had come out was the normal trickle of brake fluid, indicating the line isn’t necessarily bad.
It is worth noting that in all the times I have had my wheels off, I always torque them back to proper specs.
The only thing that I can think of as the possible cause of this may be excessive wheel hub runout, which transfers to the rotor, causing it to warp over time. The reason I suspect this is because, as I stated above, this problem didn’t begin until after the wheel bearing replacement. I’m wondering if, perhaps the hub might’ve been imperceptibly warped while we were pressing in the bearing, or, perhaps the heat from the oxy-acetylene torch my dad used to cut off the inner race from the old bearing may have heated it up enough to cause warpage. Does this sound like a possibility I should pursue? Or should I take another look at my brake hose? Perhaps there’s something else entirely that I have overlooked?
Sorry for the rather long post, but I wanted to try to preemptively answer questions that might come up and provide as much information as possible, so as to minimize the back and forth posts asking for more information.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! :cheer:
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I’m no Honda expert by any means but,
Possible causes..
1) Improperly / overly torqued lugs2) Water exposure while hot
3) Hard braking
4) Caliper partially engaging the rotor
5) Brake hose
Thanks for the reply, nightflyr. I’m pretty sure it isn’t #1 because I do always take care with torquing my lug nuts, and #2 isn’t the cause, because I always do avoid big water puddles and things like that when I can, so I know I didn’t do anything of the sort to cause that amount of water exposure to hot brake rotors. As for #3: well, it’s not impossible that I brake hard enough, but, generally, I don’t feel like I regularly brake particularly hard. Seeing as how I replaced my caliper recently, and the piston in the new unit seemed to move just fine, I very much doubt #4 is likely. So, I’m left considering #5 as possibly the most likely cause of the problem, despite the cursory test that I performed to see if I had a brake line that was holding pressure after the pedal was released, which came up negative.
Does anybody else have any other suggestions? Or does anyone else agree that I should pursue the brake hose?
A couple of things I may need to explain.
First, If it is a hose issue.
I do not believe it is a question of it holding pressure, more to the point that it may collapse when you release the pedal under certain condtions which will restrict the release of the caliper.
I’ve seen this in the past.Concerning hard breaking …
Years ago my brother purchased a brand new 1976 Mercury Cougar.
With in the first month the car developed rotor warp.
He took it back to the dealer, which they went and cut the rotors and the issue was fixed (or so he thought)
2 weeks later the symptoms began again, and again it went in to the dealer.
They cut the rotors again, so all was good ( or so they thought)
A week later.. you guessed it rotor warp again.
This time the dealer replaced the rotors and for about 3 months it was all good.
Then it began again.
Needless to say my brother was livid.
As it turned out, at the time the rotors would warp due to heat and pressure when hard braking was encountered.
BTW this was also the time frame when certain Ford/Mercury factory mag wheels would literally weld themselves to the axle flanges.
I saw my farther at his Pontiac dealership, trying to pull the rear wheel off a 1975 Mercury Montego with a tow truck and chains.
They ended up disassembling the rear end and removing the the entire assembly.Just something to keep in mind.
Sorry if it wasn’t clear, but when I referred to it holding pressure, i was referring to the same phenomenon you are, where the brake hose collapses and “holds” the braking pressure for some time after the brake pedal has been released.
Well, I suppose i’ll get a new rotor and new brake hose and cross my fingers that that solves the issue. If it doesn’t, well, I’ll be back here, I suppose. :pinch:
Thanks for the advice, nightflyr.
This is where a dial indicator and some snap gauges or bore gauge will help. You need to check runnout on the hub surface. You said a torch was used on the old bearing, very possible the knuckle could be out of round where the bearing is pressed in.
In my experience, rotors warp from two things.
If the driver always has a foot on the brake pedal, that causes them to heat up and warp. This is more common with elderly drivers.
If the caliper guide pins aren’t lubed correctly, then the brakes kinda stick and that heat warps the rotors.
Also, if the brake fluid is really old, the caliper piston gets slow to respond. In that case, do a full brake fluid flush.
It’s possible the bearing is faulty or pressed to deep. I had a bearing be faulty from the parts store almost since day one but lived with it until it was time to replace my tires and them I got an oem set of bearings and had the dealer press the bearings into the spindles since I took old bearings out. They charged me 1/4 of the total labor cost since I did ev r u thing else
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Something else to consider is the proportioning valve. Could be sending more pressure to the right front wheel. Some are built into the master cylinder. Get on a flat straight road and give the brake pedal a push. If it pulls (even a little) then that’s what I would be suspecting.
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Sorry for the radio silence the past month or so. Thanks for all the replies everyone! I just wanted to report back to let everyone know how things stand now.
So, In the middle of last month (January 2016) I serviced all the brakes on my car, including lubing slide pins, brake pads/shoes, brake fluid replacement and other things as well. In addition to that, I went ahead and replaced my right-front brake hose in hopes that that was the cause of my issue. I had my right front rotor resurfaced.
In the past, the vibration problem would begin to reappear within two to three weeks of rotor replacement. So, here we are about a month later, and the brakes are still smooth as butter! So it would appear that the brake hose was indeed the culprit.
Thanks again for the input that everyone had on this issue! Hopefully you won’t hear from me again in this thread, as that would mean the problem came back.
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