the ax is now 20 years old and the body is as good as new so i decided to treat it to a new set of front to rear brake pipes new disks,pads and shoes
when i hit the brakes the car stops eventually. the calipers are free the handbrake is perfect, there is no air in the system as i have re blead the entire system several times. the servo works and the pedal drops when the car starts. but still no good i can stand on the brake pedal and it still refuses to stop. if i was mad enough to drive it on the road at 30 it would take me approximately 20 seconds to stop.
this car has got me stumped any ideas
I had these sorts of problem on my 205GTi when I replaced the discs and pads. I reckon a lot of the blame lies with modern pad compounds being very hard and a lot harder than they were when the brakes were designed. Also, some modern pad compounds only seem to work well when hot. Do they start to work better after a few hard applications?
One thing is for sure, with new pads and discs, the bedding-in process will take for ever with hard compound pads of today and now the pads are likely to be glazed. I've heard that new pads should be bedded in using old discs and new discs should be bedded in using old pads. Makes some sense as with both new it is smooth against smooth which promotes glazing and then they'll never satisfactorily bed-in.
One thought, did you carefully remove all traces of protective grease from the new discs with solvent?
I'd be minded, if you still have them, to pop the old pads back in and use them to bed the new discs in. If you have not, remove the pads and rough up their surfaces to break the glaze with a fine rasp (don't breathe the dust) and roughen up the discs with some coarse abrasive like emery cloth.
Finally, check you were not supplied with "boy racer" high-performamce pads that do need to run very hot to work effectively.
Jim
Runner, cyclist, time triallist, duathlete, Citroen AX fan and the CCC Citroenian 'From A to Z' Columnist...
It sounds like a front brake problem - and I wonder if part of the pad is rubbing on an unmachined part of the disc - thus preventing proper contact. I had this on our ZX - admittedly with an old disc and new pads - and it seems that all pads aren't the same shape.
I'd remove the pads and look carefully att their surface - particularly at the edges - as well as the inside edge of the disc contact face.
ok just had the rear brakes apart again and chanferd the ends of the friction material re checked the adjustment and refitted. the rears are now working a lot better. as for the fronts i will strip them down later if the weather improves and recheck and maybe fit the old pads in and try that. when i fitted the disks i did remove the wax sealant with acetone so i know thats not the problem. i also dont have any pedal creep. oh well time will tell.
ok just finished front disks the calipers did move before but needed a bit of effort, stripped - cleaned- greased with lithium grease and now moves effortlessly. also roughed up old pads banged them in and had a test run the brakes were a lot better. im going to be driving it 100 miles over the weekend when i get back i will put the new pads back in and see what happens.
thanks for the suggestions chaps and have a great weekend
My Cars: Citroen C5 Aircross 8 speed Automatic, Flair Model with far to many toys and nice comfy armchair like leather seats. ha ha Ive just had a conversation with the car. setting everything up verbally
It could be that your brake servo filter is blocked.
to clean this you will need to dismantle the arm on the front of your brake servo firstly removing the brake pipes that connect to it.
then remove the cast iron filter holder and pull out the filter, wash it in clean brake fluid and refit the filter and re-bleed the brake system adding more fluid if necessary.
regards Nigel. I am surpirised no-one thought of this.
