Caliper replacement

[lccl]

My front passenger side caliper seized on me after changing my brake pads and rotors recently. I bought the rebuild kit and went at it. Things seemed to go ok, however after hooking back up, one of the pistons is still not moving. The other piston is moving no problem. From what I can tell everything went/is together properly so I'm not sure of a point of taking out the piston and doing it again. I tried to clean them very thoroughly as there was a good amount of dirt and rust so maybe they're just shot.

 

Is it necessary to replace both front calipers even though the driver side one seems to be operating normally?

 

This same thing happened to my dads outback after changing his pads and rotors, coincidence?

[GTEASER]

are you sure you have the brakes bled properly and don't have air in the line and behind the piston.

[lccl]

Yeah, that one piston just won't budge. The other moves freely

[GTEASER]

Where do you live? If you are in a salt belt state, you might be better off just getting new or rebuilt calipers. Personally I never understood why folks rebuilt them themselves.

[lccl]

Rebuild seals are $7. Re-manufactured calipers are $125, so I thought I'd give the $7 option a try first. If it worked, great. It didn't. Oh well.

 

I'm in Washington. I just decided to order both calipers, the one that seized was not in good shape, no reason the other side would be better. Does this commonly happen from old brake fluid or something?

[GTEASER]

The cylinders and pistons just get pitted from rust over time. I don't think the fluid has anything to do with it. Moreso probably from compromised seal (boots) that let moisture in.

[lccl]

The cylinders did appear rusty inside. I cleaned the $h!t out of them and the surfaces felt perfectly smooth though still with rust coloration. I couldn't see anything wrong with pistons at all except areas exposed. Seal boots did look old but no obvious problems.

[jayrex]

About a year ago I used one of those rebuild kits due to a seized caliper. The pin was seized not the piston, due to a ripped pin boot. I replaced the entire pin with the subaru part that comes with the rubber bushing thing. I just kept sticking, randomly.

So I bailed on those and picked up some remans from AutoZone. One of those seized within a year, I didnt even dig into them to find out why, just took them in and exchanged them because they have a lifetime warranty. They didnt even give me a hard time. I said "one of these is seized and I'm not sure which, can I exchange both?" ... sure why not. Done.

 

I dont have alot of miles on the new set, but so far they seem fine. Sometimes they will limit the number of times you can use the warranty (they did with my PS pump), but exchanges are difficult for them if you purchase online, so they will enter it manually and just give you the part. PM me for a sweet coupon code, I have a good one that I dont want public for fear they will take it away. $40 off if you spend $100. I used it for each caliper, 2 checkouts lol.