Brakes hanging after work done

Hey everyone.

Looking for some advice here. If anyone recognizes my account, I made a post last Oct that after doing some brake work and running down some problems, I had seizing front brakes and had to take my truck to the shop. $1,800 later the issue was fixed. Lately I’ve been having issues of my truck will be just fine, then it’ll build brake pressure, be hanging a front brake then randomly release with an audible click from the brake pedal assembly. (The actual pedal part doesn’t move though and isn’t hanging itself). Within the past two days of just normal, easy errand driving, I’ve been able to smell my left front brake without even sticking my face close to the wheel.

At this point I’ve not only crawled all over my truck, but this forum, and the internet sifting through years of posts for Tacomas and other cars, there is no sure fire answer it seems other than dump money into diagnostics and possible bandaids. (Someone had a similar issue on another forum and racked up a couple thousand dollar bill.)

My truck got new rotors, calipers, pads, brake lines, master cylinder, and ABS control module. I believe I’ve fallen into the trap of air got into the system and now i’m suffering from this weird Tacoma gremlin.

My question is this - Do I take it to the shop and pay who knows how much to have this figured out? Or just sell the truck? There’s other stuff that needs to be replaced and I’m at the point of where I’d be most likely dumping a pretty penny into this truck to make it hit the golden 300k mile mark (at 209k now).

I’m concerned as I will be getting put on orders soon and needing to drive from MN to TX and don’t entirely trust my truck to make it there and back. It’s either put an unknown amount into this truck or get something new to me…

What do you guys think?

 

For $1800, that sounds like a Module/Actuator issue.
I'd think you would also have a 12 month warranty on the work?

If you want to try finding the issue yourself. You are mostly likely going to have to start cracking brake lines open at connecting points.

 

Unfortunately they could only get reman parts so only 30 day warranty…

 

Air in the lines isn't going to make the front brakes stay clamped down..

What about that click noise under the dash? Is the brake pedal pushrod hanging up somehow?

Does the pedal feel different after you hear the noise?

If you consistently feel the brakes releasing right after hearing the noise then you need to chase after it.

 

The symptoms you’re getting, I’ll usually find the master cylinder push rod adjusted too tight generally. Or the pedal not fully returning up.

 

Figured I'd add more here now that I'm home and on my computer. Also kind of in response to the last replies...

Sometimes, the truck is perfectly fine running around with no issues even with aggressive braking. Other times, just running to the gas station will cause the brakes to hang. I've noticed no difference in OAT, wet/dry, deceleration, length of the drive, lots of turns vs less turns on a drive, etc. The only thing that seems to heighten the chance the brakes are more likely to hang is with aggressive ACCELERATION (more vacuum pressure?).

The brake pedal usually feels a bit squishy when the truck is just turned on. It feels like there is a hair of free play then depressing further it's actually doing something. When pressing the pedal, the best way I can describe it, is the pedal feels...crunchy...

Usually after some stop and go, the pedal begins to get more firm, almost to where it feels like breathing on the pedal is making the truck nose dive, then, randomly, I'll hear an audible click coming from the footwell and the brakes release and the excess pressure relieves - returning the pedal to feeling a bit squishy. I've tried pulling on the pedal when I can feel the brakes hanging (which just makes the truck feel sluggish) and it will not move towards me any further. I've left my foot just touching the pedal and felt this click, there is no movement of the pedal.

I've looked at the linkages attached to the pedal and the spring and nothing seems amiss... Letting the truck just idle doesn't seem to cause any issue... It just seems to be that the truck builds pressure, dumps it, builds it up and dumps it when using the brakes...

The other thing to note is that if I get on the highway, sometimes it'll be perfectly fine and other times the truck will slowly start to shake more and more almost to the point it feels like death wobble. Sometimes this will just go away as it came on and other times I can lightly tap the breaks and it usually makes it stop all together or severely lessens the shaking. I want to emphasize that if the brakes were not hanging as I was getting onto the highway, you can literally feel the truck just start to shake more and more.

I cannot feel the truck pulling one way or the other... It pulls a little to the right anyways due to it needing a slight alignment but even with the front driver hanging the most, it doesn't correct or over correct for the trucks natural tendency to pull right.

Recently I've felt the brakes begin to hang, and I'll just feel the truck kind of lurch forward with no report from the footwell and the truck feels fine again.

I'm thinking maybe there is something going on with the brake booster/push rod however I feel like if that was the case the issue would present itself at all times and not release pressure instead of just 65-85% of driving time.

 

Just to clarify on the aggressive acceleration part, I generally drive pretty tame, but when I really romp on the gas, I can almost guarantee the next time I even tap the brakes, they will hang. Other times its just a build up of pressure.

 

I would suspect this as a root cause.

 

Does that truck have electro-boost or vacuum booster for brake assist?

The shaking is probably the rotors warping from heat when the caliper is clamped down

 

I unfortunately did not have the funds at the time to shell out the big bucks for a brand new ABS control Module on top of the labor.

 

Vacuum. Before my truck was taken to the shop, the brakes would fully seize to the point I could do a burnout without touching the brake pedal (cool party trick I suppose). At one point doing a test drive during this time, I bled off the pressure at the calipers, removed the vaccuum hose venting the brake booster to atmosphere and I was able to limp it back to my house. I brought this up with the technicians at the shop I took it to and they said even after a while of venting the brake booster, they would still lock up prior replacing the ABS control module and other work they did.

I thought once rotors were warped, they were warped and had to be replaced/resurface? I can feel the truck start to shake which gets progressively worse until the brakes release and then that instant the truck is smooth as a top.

 

It's shaking because the brakes are clamped down and they're super hot.

It really sounds like a issue related to the vacuum booster and the pushrod going through it.

Pulling up on the pedal and the engine feeling sluggish could be a vacuum leak inside the booster, like the diaphragm. When the brake pedal travel has any affect on the overall runnability of the engine it's almost always a vacuum leak at the booster. At work if I suspect a leaking booster I'll watch fuel trims on a scan tool and see if they go way positive (adding fuel) when I push the brakes, indicating a vacuum leak

 

I only ask about the rotors being warped because my first car had warped rotors when I bought it at 15 and it felt entirely different than this. I wouldn't doubt my rotors are warped a little bit at this point but I was under the impression once rotors are warped, they are warped.

Pulling on the pedal doesn't change anything, I meant when the brakes are hanging, the truck just feels sluggish, down on power. Bad spot to put that point haha

 

If you have a noise from under the dash you're gonna have to crawl under there and start looking

 

Didn't mean to suggest that part was the cause. I thought you were saying all parts were remans.

Calipers being the most suspect to me to your hanging problem

Sorry if I misunderstood.

 

To my understanding the ABS control module was reman, everything else was new.

I’m not saying the calipers arent the issue, but when I initially did a brake job in Oct, I replaced both calipers, then re-replaced the driver side, then ended up throwing in the towel and taking it to the shop. The shop then re-re-replaced the calipers (I know they did this because they gave me the calipers back to get my money back at Autozone).