Citroen Xantia front brakes

[Xantianut]

Ay up!

The front brakes on Fifi are seized, not only the pistons in the calipers but the calipers, carriers, hubs, screws and pins are rusted into virtually one piece of metal.

These I can sort with a big wrecking bar, piece of scaffold tube, BIG hammer and drift plus various cleaning materials, Thing is, I reckon I'm likely to shear one of the brake caliper mounting bolts, such is the force likely to be needed to sort these recalcitrant items. Oh, and my bad language will be heard all over the county!

Does anyone know where I can get hold of replacements? Even if they come out in one piece, I'm not entirely happy with entrusting my life to four badly fatigued pieces of threaded bar.

[myglaren]

Drown everything in Plus-Gas.
Repeat the drowning every six hours for a couple or three days and the various components will come apart a lot more easily and with less damage that otherwise.

If you look in the For Sale & Wanted forum there are some Xantias being broken that may yield the parts you need.
If you want new parts there are a fw suppliers that may be satisfactory.
One is called something like Wadia, but isn't, I suspect. Chris (citroenmad) has dealt with them and found them to be good and with reasonable prices.
Will check this evening.

[Rhothgar]

Good advice from Steve there.

Another technique if you have never used it is once you get the bolts moving, don't simply keep winding them out. If they feel tight or as though they are getting tighter, wind them all the way back in again and unscrew and repeat...... as many times as you need.

Rust has a tendency to clog the threads and build up in the threads until you apply so much force that the bolts shear. This is a particularly useful method for... calipers!

I have used it to good effect on the rears on my series 1 when I fitted new genuine discs and pads eariler this year.

[addo]

If at all possible for such a stuck assembly, remove the entire hub carrier.

Then you may use an impact driver or similar with correct bit for loosening the caliper brackets.

You can get the caliper carriers sandblasted and repaint them yourself with epoxy-based rust paint (or have them zinc passivate plated).

Exchange rebuilt calipers are fairly priced from a few sources.

[Xantianut]

Ay up!

I got the brakes off no worries. A breaker bar and a 4 foot length of scaffolding pole and..... job done.

The bolt threads were unmarked by the removal violence so I simply copper greased them and put them back awaiing the delivery of the air blow gun to extract the pistons.