Painted Caliper and New Brake Pads

[tacti]

It is such a beautiful day and my brake has been squeaking for a while, so i spent some time and first time, i changed my brake pads by myself.
First, i was going to take my car to a shop, but finding it will cost $130, where i can do it myself for less than $40.

I went to local autozone and bought ceramic brake pads.
i got home and took wheels off and take brake pads off, i found that the brake pads i got was different size from what i had on stock.
I called autozone and found that there are early model and late model on 04 solara, and late models use the one on 05 models.
since they did not have ceramic 05 pads, i went to another shop and bought one for even cheaper than autozone.

after i put the brake pads, i went ahead and painted the caliper.
the guy at the store told me to use the spray one and it'll be easier.
however, it was pain to keep everything else covered where i don't want to paint.

anyways, long story short, i ended up painting only the caliper, and need to get some other paint for the small part around the brake pads.

I'm thinking of getting different color like white, how do you think about that?
do you think it'll be weird to have two tones?
(I'm talking about the socket for the brake pads.)
I'm open to any suggestions!

Here's the picture for now.




Tact

[woa_its_j3ff]

personally speaking i agree white would look great on the calipers,but not one set to be red and one set white..

go with the white =)

[RichD978]

go with red. white will look ricey

[michaels artic frost]

Looks great Tact! I'm glad you were able to finish the brake job. Nice work!

-M

[solaraluv]

What do yall think about silver?

[bassthrive]

I painted my calipers silver and I love the look. Only other color I was considering was black. I do like the red - it looks "sporty" - but whatever you do I vote for painting both parts of the caliper. FYI - removing the parts from the car completely allowed me to get better paint coverage and not worry about getting it in the wrong places.

[tacti]

I got another question on brakes.
when i replaced the break pads, i unplugged the brake fluid hose.. (which i guess i shouldn't have done.. )
i found some brake fluid came out, and quickly put it back on.
my co-worker told me that i need to let the air out of brake line once i opened it up.
do you guys have any idea how i can do that? or do i really need to do that in first place?
I have driven this morning, and did not notice any problem.

or should i just unplug everything again and paint the caliper, and re-add the break fluid?
i've never done this before, so i'm just hoping it's not going to mess things up...

thanks in advance.

Tact

[MikeATL]

I got another question on brakes.
when i replaced the break pads, i unplugged the brake fluid hose.. (which i guess i shouldn't have done.. )
i found some brake fluid came out, and quickly put it back on.
my co-worker told me that i need to let the air out of brake line once i opened it up.
do you guys have any idea how i can do that? or do i really need to do that in first place?
I have driven this morning, and did not notice any problem.

or should i just unplug everything again and paint the caliper, and re-add the break fluid?
i've never done this before, so i'm just hoping it's not going to mess things up...

thanks in advance.

Tact

not sure what you should do, but if you do need to bleed the breaklines thats going to be a pain in the @ss.

[tacti]

That's encouraging... ^^;
I really don't know if i need to do that or not, but just someone told me that i need to do...

does anyone who has disconnect the brake hoses? or have i done something i really shouldn't have done...

hope... i don't have to...

tact

[SleeperSolara]

Not bad now some rims.

[RichD978]

I did the same exact thing. I had to have my buddy bunthy come bleed one of the lines for me. I bought one of those one man bleeder's. It seemed really easy. If you can have someone more experienced show you how to bleed it I would highly recommend that.

[tacti]

Thanks guys. I guess i'll stop by at local autozone and see if they have any bleeder thing available.

also, rims... i really want, but not enough money, and there are other things i want to do first.. like lowering and tinting windows...

[Down2TheC]

If you have air in your system you'll know. Air in two lines would make for spongy brakes. Air in one line would give you a big pull to the other side when you brake. So if you're braking fine, then don't try to bleed.

If you have to bleed, you don't need a special tool. You just need a friend to pump the brakes for you. Also if you only disconnected one brake line briefly, you only need to bleed that caliper a little. If the resevoir looks full then you didn't get air in the master. If you still want to bleed, tag me. In general though, try not to open the system and bleed whatever you open. All you need is a hose to connect to the bleed valve.

Color... I'm thinking for your car, red or black would work best. Though silver would give it the fresh from the factory look.

[Solorange]

Just paint them red, looks good though!

[tacti]

Thanks for the comment guys.

i do not have any weird feel on my brake nor pulling to one side. so i guess i don't have any air, or little if it does.
i've already got the one-man-bleeder, so i just keep it for the next time.

My next oil change/tire rotation is in 2,000 miles, and probably it will be within 3 weeks or less, so i think i will take the caliper off that time and paint whole thing red.
silver sound good as well, but from the poll, i think i go with red ^^

if i have too much time on my hand on any weekends, probably i just go ahead and do the caliper paint sooner.

again, thanks for the advice.

Tact