'R' front Calipers replaced - want to refurb old ones

[2retro]

I just had a picture in my head of Chris, on a good night out, sucking someone’s nappies :?

Ewwwwwwww :shock:

 

[renegade79]

Lo there.

Last week my 4 yr old R failed the MOT because of sticking front calipers.
This after only 22.8k miles!! - and also having previously had the disks replaced under warranty.
TIA

Can you still drive a car in UK with a failed MOT? I presume they give you a few days grace to get any issue rectified??

 

[2retro]

Can you still drive a car in UK with a failed MOT? I presume they give you a few days grace to get any issue rectified??

You may take your vehicle for its MOT test up to a month before your current certificate ends and you can still legally drive your vehicle if it fails the test and its existing MOT certificate is still valid (i.e. if your test was before the expiry date).

However the fact that your vehicle has failed its MOT means there are faults with the vehicle and if you do get stopped by the police you could be prosecuted if your vehicle is not roadworthy so even though you have a valid certificate you could still be breaking the law by using a vehicle with a known fault on the road.

So it is highly recommended to get the repairs fixed as soon as possible and not to drive the vehicle too much in the meantime.

 

[tianorth]

The MOT certificate is valid for a year but only to say your vehicle was roadworthy on that day.
It is the drivers responsibility to ensure it is fit for the road - if it is not then it shouldn't be on the road, but who nowadays checks their car every day? Who nowadays checks it weekly or monthly or quarterly etc?

Having a brake light or another essential external bulb bulb not working, means it is not roadworthy, but how many do you see with a headlight or tail or brake lights not working?

Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk

 

[stagger321]

The MOT certificate is valid for a year but only to say your vehicle was roadworthy on that day.
It is the drivers responsibility to ensure it is fit for the road - if it is not then it shouldn't be on the road, but who nowadays checks their car every day? Who nowadays checks it weekly or monthly or quarterly etc?

Having a brake light or another essential external bulb bulb not working, means it is not roadworthy, but how many do you see with a headlight or tail or brake lights not working?

Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk

That is so true. Back in the day with my first car, and with our other family cars we would always be tinkering under the bonnet and checking that everything was working.
These days with modern cars they are largely a lot more reliable and certainly a ton more complicated.
We expect them to work, rather than living in hope that they will start - such was the cars with some of my early cars. I know there are exceptions to the rule, but overall drivers don't think twice and don't check anything before driving.
The internal diagnostics give you so much feedback, that no-one generally checks road worthiness.
Simples

 

[stagger321]

Back to my spare Calipers, which are sat all nice and warm in the boxes from the new/fitted calipers.
I'd still like these refurbed.

So, on advise I have phoned Godspeedbrakes and (as a comparison) also BCS Automotive.

The issues with these Alcon units as has been indicated before is that they are pretty much Race calipers on a Road car. They are not expected to be stripped down as often as a Race caliper, yet they have no dust seal on the pistons and only use cr@ppy mild steel pistons. So these rot.

1) Tianorth has provided the pricing for the Calipers from Pug. Pistons on these will rot as above,
2) As I stated before Godspeed brakes have quoted me £480 for a fulll strip, repaint, decals, reseal and new stainless pistons (assuming these are the same as the Astra 888 calipers)
3) BCS Automotive are quoting me for their standard red paint (no decals) its £728, or £798 for swanky premium paint with decals. They have a discount ending today (as they are moving soon) which brings the price down to £674 for standard, £732 for Premium. They source genuine Alcon parts (pistons + seals) which they tell me are v expensive, but these will I assume be cr@ppy mild steel pistons.

Has anyone out there got any other sources that can do this work incl piston replacement for these very specialised Calipers?

TIA

 

[Spart]

Hi, if you took them apart and had a measure I'm sure you could find which pistons and seals Alcon have used from the link below.
http://www.jdl-brakes.com/alcon-service-parts.html

I would think you would still have steel pistons though.

Apparently http://www.hispeccalipers.co.uk/ would make stainless pistons too, might be worth a phone call.

This might be of use toohttp://www.reyland.co.uk/discs/

 

[stagger321]

Hi, if you took them apart and had a measure I'm sure you could find which pistons and seals Alcon have used from the link below.
http://www.jdl-brakes.com/alcon-service-parts.html

I would think you would still have steel pistons though.

Apparently http://www.hispeccalipers.co.uk/ would make stainless pistons too, might be worth a phone call.

This might be of use toohttp://www.reyland.co.uk/discs/

Thanks.
I have a digital caliper and was planning on popping the pistons out this afternoon after work to measure.
Then I was going to see if these were the same spec as the Astra 888 pistons Godspeed supply.

I would think you would still have steel pistons though.

Why do you think this - if people like Godspeed already provide Stainless pistons for other Alcon Calipers? Just wondering.

 

[Spart]

Why do you think this - if people like Godspeed already provide Stainless pistons for other Alcon Calipers? Just wondering.

I meant if you went for the first option and got Alcon pistons from Alcon.

 

[stagger321]

Why do you think this - if people like Godspeed already provide Stainless pistons for other Alcon Calipers? Just wondering.

I meant if you went for the first option and got Alcon pistons from Alcon.

OK. Gotcha

 

[DKZ5745]

There’s a new member on here “robrac” who seems to have a lot of experience working on cars. He might know of some contacts that may be useful to you. :eusa-think:

 

[Spart]

Any updates on the piston size's?

 

[stagger321]

Any updates on the piston size's?

Thanks for reminding me. I'll get to it shortly. :thumbup:

 

[stagger321]

Any updates on the piston size's?

Sorry this took a while
41.3mm and 37.8mm O/D measured with a digital vernier.

 

[stagger321]

OK folks,

Sent my spare (free) set of Calipers off to Godspeed and this is what they made of them.
New non-rotting stainless pistons fitted :dance:
Yet to receive them, but looking good so far :beer:

Before:

After:

 

[Plecodoras]

They look the dogs doo dahs - well done.

Do you expect there to be any gains with using this new stainless steel setup over the standard ones, or is it purely a maintenance thing?

Cheers M. :beer:

 

[stagger321]

They look the dogs doo dahs - well done.

Do you expect there to be any gains with using this new stainless steel setup over the standard ones, or is it purely a maintenance thing?

Cheers M. :beer:

No performance gains expected TBH.
But that's no biggie, as these calipers with the stock mild steel pistons stop on a sixpence anyway.
This is a long term investment, in that even the ones that are currently sitting on my R and have been swapped under warranty should fail at some point in the future.

I would recommend that anyone who is running an R on roads especially over the autumn/winter months, should consider this option of an upgrade.
Road salt, and other sh*t on the roads will destroy the stock pistons, and you may already be running with a compromised brakes.
It is kinda madness that Peugeot sport spec'd out calipers with no dust seals.

In my case I checked the original set (that Peugeot warranty let me have for free, and that you see have been refurbed) and of the 8 pistons, 3 had fused to the caliper.
On several occasions before I took my R in to be checked, my car tried to kill me.
Under-steer, followed by boot loads of liftoff over-steer mid corner. Scary.

 

[Spart]

I see Alcon do spare pistons 41.3mm at £38.23, I guess for 2 and they do 38.1mm, same price. But not sure if the 38.1mm is right? It seems 38.1mm is quite often used, but 37.8mm I can't find anyone else who uses it so maybe the 38.1mm is the one? But you would still have steel pistons.


I'm sure with a bit of digging if Alcon uses standard size pistons you could fine stainless.


Pays your money etc etc...…….

 

[stagger321]

I don't know what to say about the difference in sizes.
Where are you getting this info from (incl prices).
I took whatever pistons I could remove (after soak in WD40 and a blast of compressed air) from the calipers and measured the two sizes large and small with a digital caliper. That is what they came out at and they seem to tally with the sizes when I checked with Godspeed.
They checked their pistons for the Astra 888 (which uses the same basic calipers as the R we have now established). Hence I went ahead with the refurb.
Whatever you could get from Alcon (and they won't sell to you direct) is pretty much guaranteed to be the same chrome plated mild steel as you would have in your R now. They won't have changed to stainless steel.
The only difference I have heard about is that on later R calipers they have been including what looks like an additional steel weight (counterbalance??) on the bottom edge of the caliper. I don't see this on either of my sets.

I have spoken to Godspeed this morning (and they couldn't be more helpful btw) and they said my 3 stuck pistons had to be removed hydraulically. They were amazed how badly corroded in they were when I told them they had only done 24k miles!! :shock:

 

[2retro]

They've done a good job with yours, Stagger. :thumbup:

Jeez, so many horror stories about owners having to replace the brakes on the R now the car's a few years old though.

It's shocking that this happens so incredibly frequently on a performance car like this. Not as shocking as the cost of replacing them though! Who the hell expects to spend that much on a car and have the callipers seize up after few years?! I've never had a car's callipers seize up before!

I pity people who have to fork out of the their own pocket for these expensive mo-fo's since they seem to fail just after the 3 year warranty runs out! Shocking. :shock: