[Vwdiesel] 85 Jetta TD Front brakes locking up

[James Hansen]

The bushings that the caliper moves on must be stuck/rusty/seized.

remove the two allen head bolts that holds the caliper on, there are 
plastic sleeve things in there that they call caliper bearings, remove 
those too. (fish them out)

Polish the bolts on a wire wheel, clean the caliper inside bit where 
this stuff came from well, antisneeze the heck out of it, and reassemble.

Problem should vanish.

Head gasket would be incidental.
So would the master cylinder change.

Problem is in the calipers.

I bet you have one pad worn way more than the other too, on the side 
opposite the piston.  The caliper moves over to squeeze on the rotor, 
but can't move back, because the semi-stuck bushings hold it from moving.

There is special high temp grease for caliper bushings, but anti-seize 
works just fine.

-james

Doyt W. Echelberger wrote:
> About a month ago my aging 85 Jetta TD developed a brake problem. I'd drive 
> it about 5 miles and then the front brakes started dragging and making the 
> engine labor. The front hubs got hot and were smoking, and I had to stop 
> driving the car and let everything cool down.  This problem developed on 
> the test drive after replacing the head gasket, which may only be 
> incidental.  Same brake problem showed up about 6 months ago, and I swapped 
> in a new master cylinder and the problem went away.
> 
> OK, I did some easy fixes....  First, I replaced the master cylinder. It 
> was still under warranty and the replacement was free, so I just did it. 
> That stopped the passenger side front brake problem, but the driver side 
> front brake just kept on locking up.  "I'm gonna fix that," (sez I).....and 
> replaced the caliper and both the hard line and the flexible hose on that 
> side.   It didn't change anything except the thickness of my wallet.
> 
> Driver front brake still locks up after driving about 5 miles.
> 
> So, all the easy answers seem to be used up.   I'm obviously overlooking 
> something....probably obvious to someone....or at least I hope so.     Help.
> 
> Doyt Echelberger
> old guy in Ohio
> 
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