Pulsating Brakes after Replacement

Hello all ! Long time lurker here.
128k miles on original brakes... yep they were due

I replaced the rotors/pads, and while I purchased new drums/shoes, I opted to skip the shoes as they were really in great shape. I know, all that trouble and didn't change them but honestly they were fine. I also swapped the fluid for some fresh clean stuff. I purchased some stainless steel lines... honestly could not get the original lines off, and said screw it before I ended up stripping them. Yes, using all the right tools So I do have some new stainless steel lines if anyone is interested (front and rear) Stoptech Brand. 62 for both... would make someone a good deal on them if interested.

Anyway....

Rotors - Power Stop Cross Drilled and Slotted Rotors
Pads - Hawk Superduty Brake Pads
Drums - Centric Premium Brake Drums

Other than a pain in the ass to remove / replace the rotors...
I followed break-in instructions after installing and torquing everything to specs.

Brakes felt great honestly, pedal was a little low, but after some "emergency stops" I was really amazed how quick they grabbed.

5 days later, once they heat up, stop/go traffic or red light to red light... they start to pulsate from 30mph to stop. This is under normal braking. Sometimes I barely notice it, but sometimes it's enough to vibrate stuff inside the cabin.

New tires went on about 2 weeks after the brakes, so I know it's not the tires.

I'm about to just say screw it and live with it, but I was pretty pumped with the deals I got on the brake parts compared to the dealer estimates. I love doing stuff my self, but damn it brand new brakes shouldn't be doing this!?

Any thoughts?

I've read reviews about Hawk and Powerstop brands and not found anything similar.

Thanks in advance.

Pics uploaded just for fun

 

when driving, SLOWLY apply the parking brake and see if the truck shakes. if it does, the problem is in the rear. you dont want to lock them up, just put enough pressure on them to see if the truck shakes. if they do, the drums need to be turned. (not uncommon even for off the shelf new ones) we used to turn new brand new drums for that reason.

sadly if they are the rotors, i dont know of any shop that will turn powerslots. you may have some rust or other debris on the wheel flange. hope that helps.

 

you should've cleaned those pins up in the caliper so the pads can float freely. Sounds like warped rotors, were the wheels put on with an impact?

 

I will absolutely try this out tomorrow morning, thank you !

I did clear out a lot of rust on every wheel, using either compressed air, wire brush and/or brake kleen.

 

I did clean them a little with a wire brush, as my wire wheel on my grinder was gunked up with stuff. I don't think that's the cause of the vibration but I'm willing to pull the wheels and pins tomorrow to try it, definitely won't take long at all.

Wheels were put back on with cordless impact gun... honestly not even to the factory torque specs. I lowered it from there and torqued to the 85ft pounds. Even went back to re-torque after 2 days, but they hadn't moved at all.

The vibration started about 5 days later, so I can't really blame it on the idiots at Town Fair Tire when they put on the new tires, which was 2 weeks after the brakes were put on. I did check their work though, and they had only torqued to 82 pounds.

 

I opted to try out the parking brake while driving.... sure enough there's the vibration ! And it's even worse just using the parking brake vs using the brake pedal.

- Thank you DEMikey !

So am I to assume the drums are crap? Can a dealer turn these at all?

 

I bought some Raybestos drums from Amazon for my last truck, they were out of round so bad I knew it when I installed them and adjusted the shoes. I complained to Amazon and took them to our local Napa that has a machine shop, they turned them for $14 ea and Amazon reimbursed me the $28. No issues after that.

Is there a reason you replaced the drums? On that OLD F150, they were old, out of round and the surface was messed up, every morning it would lock the rears up once and then I was good. If the pads were fine and you weren't having any trouble, put the old drums back on.

 

Honestly the only reason I opted to replace them was Autoanything had a great deal on them, free shipping. I figured, what the hell, go with all brand new stuff for another 128k miles and I'll be happy. Lesson learned I guess.

I'll talk to the dealer tomorrow to get a quote and then worst case reach out to a local Napa.

Thank you for the reply !

 

Cheap/junk rotors. Why did you go with cross-drilled and slotted rotors on a Tacoma...do you track the truck or something?

 

LOL Nope, no track times here.
Again it was all about the good deals with free shipping. These rotors have great reviews from several websites, free shipping, and way cheaper than the stock replacements.

The drums... yeah, not so sure those were the best brand names out there, but cheaper than the dealer / auto parts store replacements.

 

Steer clear of those cross-drilled and slotted rotors, sellers tend to take cheap rotors and try to dress them up for profit. I didn't even run cross-drilled and slotted rotors on my M3 and that car saw repeated threshold breaking from 100+ MPH on a regular basis. Good luck getting the brakes sorted out.

 

Well if you getting vibration when breaking that means something is warped. Most likely front rotors. Check backlash on everything and you will find a culprit.
My money is on rotors as it sounds they were installed wrong and got warped after usage.
If rotors are warped you need new rotors.

 

Good info there.

 

The caliper Pistons on these trucks are prone to seizing. Usually inboard lower ones. Pushing the Pistons back in the calipers to make room for newer thicker pads has probably put one or more of them in contact with a rusted cylinder wall.

All you need is for one piston to be providing an uneven force to get a vibration.