Dragging caliper away from home

Hypothetical: My boat trailer has disc brakes on all 4. While 50 miles from home I notice a wheel is getting very hot. I jack it up to discover the caliper is dragging. What can I do to alleviate the situation so I can limp home? Aside from locking out the brakes completely, the only thing I can think of is crack the bleeder to relieve pressure and try to find something to pinch the hose. Wondering if anyone has better ideas.

That's what I'd do. Crack the bleeder, and see if it continues to drag, if so maybe you can use a C-clamp to pinch the hose to keep the caliper from applying. My experience with disc brake calipers is once they start dragging they usually continue, unless it's the guide pins and not the actual piston in the caliper. On our first Subaru the grease in the guide pins congealed and caused that problem. On the other hand, on our Jeeps, when the caliper started dragging, it was either the caliper or a defective brake hose.

I would remove the caliper and lube the guide pins. If the guide pins seem to be ok, you likely have a stuck piston. As mentioned, see if you can push in the piston to get it unstuck.

Carry a big screwdriver or pry bar in your tool kit to back off the pads if bleeder doesn't do it. A small C clamp or it it has metal lines, bend it sharply to stop fluid flow. Push comes to shove, remove the caliper and suspend it to the frame and get home.

airshot said:

Carry a big screwdriver or pry bar in your tool kit to back off the pads if bleeder doesn't do it. A small C clamp or it it has metal lines, bend it sharply to stop fluid flow. Push comes to shove, remove the caliper and suspend it to the frame and get home.

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If you do that you probably want to stick a piece of wood in the caliper to keep the piston in.

I would back the piston off, then use a vice grip to close off the line

I had replaced all my calipers, hoses, pads, and rotors on my jeep. Two weeks later I was about 10 miles from home and I had to keep my foot on the gas as the rig felt like it was working rather hard. Took a couple miles to find a side road to pull off the highway with heavy traffic. No shoulder to escape! got out and all four wheels were smoking! Got a ride to home and went back a few hours later to try and get it home, the brakes had released by then. The dam master cylinder had went south, never had that ever happen before that it would lock up all four. Got it home without using the brakes.

Other than the time we pulled over and the drum was glowing in the dark, just locked out the coupler and do what I had to do to free up the wheel.

Came home with brake shoes in the back of the truck a couple of times.

Had a disc sticking off and one night. Locked out the coupler and came home with a caliper strapped to the frame of the trailer.

Good ideas, thanks guys.

Gee, This is pretty late, but, it can help someone else. Brake components are tough iron. You can hit them with a hammer and not damage them, mostly. Crack the bleeder and shove a big screwdriver into the pad/rotor space and tap it with a hammer.

Rotors are pretty cheap and pads are also. Replace the rusty stuff...

Chris1956 said:

Gee, This is pretty late, but, it can help someone else. Brake components are tough iron. You can hit them with a hammer and not damage them, mostly. Crack the bleeder and shove a big screwdriver into the pad/rotor space and tap it with a hammer.

Rotors are pretty cheap and pads are also. Replace the rusty stuff...

Click to expand...

Agree. I have a caliper on order but not sure it's gonna get here before next planned outing so good chance I'm facing this situation before Sunday/Monday of next. I'll need to tow around 40 miles round trip to the ramp. My plan, If caliper does not arrive, is to drive the boat storage (1.5 hr from house), remove wheel, remove cap on master cylinder, pinch caliper back in place with a c-clamp and pinch the hose before heading out. Once I launch I'll release the hose pincher and store in the truck while on the water because I don't like the idea of leaving the hose pinched for extended periods. Before loading I'll re-pinch, etc. Something else I'm wondering about however is, according to the manual, the rotor minimum thickness is 17mm. The rotor/hub combo is 22 years old. I may have exceeded that so I will be taking something to measure it with. Wondering if this may have contributed to the caliper dragging. The caliper is only a few years old.