Re: [help][brakes]urgent

["Lauri Pettai" <laurts@netexpress.ee>]

I own '84 Scirocco GTi and I'm having same problems. Firs brakes are just
fine but the rear brakes do exactly nothing. So I thought that maybe the
rear brake cilinders are not moving. Then I did many times just accelerating
and braking, accelerating and braking, It ended up with that, that one of
rear brakes started to work almost well and the other one stil don't. It's
awful, becaus when I hit the brake pedal really hard my car looses control
and starts to turn to one side. Now I'm almost getting used to it! But still
I need a fix. Maybe I'll start with new pads. Before it I'll just check the
condition of them.
Funny thing is, that ebrake (wich is mechanical) works just the same way.
This means from one side well and from other side nothing.

 Lauri!
 '83 Scirocco GTX (sold)
 '84 Scirocco GTi Kamei X1 Body Kit (current)
 I'll put up a Website very very soon...

-----Original Message-----
From: JGies@skandia.com <JGies@skandia.com>
To: scirocco-l@privateI.com <scirocco-l@privateI.com>
Date: 20. jaanuar 1998. A. 20:14
Subject: [help][brakes]urgent


>I have a problem with my '88 16v Scirocco brakes that's stumping me.  At
>around 100,000 miles, i had a small local shop replace the following due
>to wear:  Front Rotors, Front Pads, Rear Pads.  My brake performance
>before and after the brake work was marginal at best.  brakes only
>grabbed after pedal was 1/3 to 1/2 of the way down, and even then, it
>took a bit of effort to get the car to stop as it should.  This was
>weird, because the braking performance of this car was always
>exceptional-I remember the car for the first 70-80,000 miles was
>incredible when it came to stopping.  those germans knew what they were
>doing when they built the 16v brake system.  so the difference when the
>system deteriorated was quite noticible.  i should point out that my
>rear caliper ebrake mechanism had frozen on both sides (common for these
>cars as i understand), so the ebrake on the car had been inoperable
>since about 50-60,000 miles.
>
>anyways, after the brake fix at 100,000 i drove the car for another
>13,000, until an accident in October 1996 (minor frontal damage, now
>fixed), with mediocre brake performance.  Now that the car is repaired
>post-accident, i need to get it through inspection to get plates on it
>again.  To get through inspection, the ebrake must hold the car.  So, I
>call Mark at Adirondack and order two rebuilt rear calipers, install
>them, bled the system (dot4 fluid) and...ebrake doesn't work and brake
>performance is still mediocre (brakes only grabbed after pedal was 1/3
>to 1/2 of the way down, slightly stronger grab now).
>
>So, off to the bentley i go for troubleshooting.  Figure i need to
>replace master cylinder.  Did it this weekend.  Virtually no improvement
>in brake performance.  Ebrake still doesn't operate, although i can hear
>the pads making a slight scraping noise indicating that they are in
>contact with the rotor, however slightly.
>
>Ouch, that hurt, even though Mark got me the part at a MAJOR discount
>from the dealer (something like 1/3 the price!)  Go Mark!  And Thanks.
>Got the opportunity to do some road testing on some snow/slippery
>surfaces, and found that while the front brakes performed well (locked
>up on snow rather easily), the rears were not locking under full pedal
>on snow.
>
>CONCLUSION: i believe that my problems can be traced to the rear brakes
>and the lack of stopping power being applied to the rear wheels.  I
>believe this due to a)no ebrake performance (even with new pads and new
>calipers); b)generally weak brake performance all around; c)no rear
>lockup on snow under full pedal.
>
>The problems could be:
>1. bad pressure regulators
>2. contaminated rear pads and/or rotors
>3. old rotors
>
>I am overwhelmingly leaning towards the pressure regulators as the cause
>of the problem.  Any thoughts/comments/suggestions/similar experiences
>would be very helpful.  I'm running out of options and money!
>
>thanks
>
>john
>jgies@skandia.com
>'88 16v Alpine White
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