AutoZone Calipers

[hammerheadfistpunch]

Give me a reason not to use AutoZone re-manufactured calipers. They are $50 with a $22 core compared to...seriously...$480 for a Toyota re-manufactured passenger front (twice as much as a driver for some reason). I think I have a stuck piston causing me no end of grief. Also, do them as pairs? or single caliper only is fine?

 

[Death Star]

I used NAPA calipers. The quality is good and they come painted black, not raw.

 

[duggy]

$50 is cheap enough to replace in a pair.

 

[hj 60]

Those drivers that used them are not anymore here to tell

I refurbished mine, stock piston aint that hard to clean up and might need a new oring, I bought the set but not everything was busted, also cleaned the pistons.
Do you need to give the old calipers? moslty I do not like chinese stuff, it is made for three month fixes.

landcruiser 60 cailper | eBay

 

[mechanist]

Amazon. Same price. Free shipping. No core charge.

Rebuild your old calipers and either sell or have as a back-up.

I did as a pair but wish I had gone ahead and done all four wheels as I'm having a hard time actuating the ABS to bleed the system. I really don't want to mess with it again once it's all done.

 

[hammerheadfistpunch]

Those drivers that used them are not anymore here to tell

I refurbished mine, stock piston aint that hard to clean up and might need a new oring, I bought the set but not everything was busted, also cleaned the pistons.
Do you need to give the old calipers? moslty I do not like chinese stuff, it is made for three month fixes.

landcruiser 60 cailper | eBay

I've never rebuilt a caliper, what level of difficulty are we talking about? Any special tools?

 

[mechanist]

Level of difficulty:
Level of skill required:

Only special tools are a small piece of wood and compressed air.

 

[mechanist]

texasknowhow vid

 

[hammerheadfistpunch]

texasknowhow vid

Its not getting the brakes done thats the issue, its that the caliper seems stuck. I'm familiar with getting in the hub. too familiar.

 

[toyotaspeed90]

Give me a reason not to use AutoZone re-manufactured calipers. They are $50 with a $22 core compared to...seriously...$480 for a Toyota re-manufactured passenger front (twice as much as a driver for some reason). I think I have a stuck piston causing me no end of grief. Also, do them as pairs? or single caliper only is fine?

Those drivers that used them are not anymore here to tell

That literally makes no sense. A caliper that is going to fail will leak fluid past the seals or past bleeder screws that aren't tightened down. It will be obvious that you have low or lowering pressure. Since calipers are usually installed with new pads and minimum thickness rotors - there isn't going to be a piston blow out and complete loss of fluid/braking power. Even with a leak at 1 corner you will still have some stopping power at the other 3 corners so long as there is fluid in the reservoir.... but a soft pedal will be obvious from the get go.


Amazon, Napa, and OReilly (& any other parts stores) most likely don't carry brand new calipers for our vehicles. It's too expensive to reverse engineer then build calipers... especially when they are pretty specific to something like a Land Cruiser, and in OE specification if it does match other vehicles, it's a select few. It isn't like a Ford where the caliper covers 10 years, 6 or 7 models, and there are literally millions of vehicles - where a company may stand to make profit from manufacturing "new".

What that means - is that the companies they source parts from get cores (from customers, junkyards, etc) and go through and rebuild them to OE spec using OE spec parts that you would/could otherwise buy to rebuild yourself.

Usually they come with a lifetime warranty....

I have new napa calipers on my 40 because it sat for 30 years (well, to be fair I think the front axle in it only sat for 10 years). Rarely have I needed to replace calipers on a Toyota (yes, I've had a lot of them).

 

[ranma21]

I think your dealer or source for the Genuine Toyota caliper is milking you too much. The list price for a new Toyota caliper is about $404 a piece, with mud vendor discount, you should be able to get a new one for about $300. I remember I picked up the reman Toyota one for half or less few years back.

You can certainly try aftermarket reman caliper but I will shy away from Autozone, bought some reman caliper for my Accord and the damn thing was bent, wasted my time and almost screw up my other new brake parts!! Have you not consider rebuild the caliper with OE parts? That will be cheap.

 

[hammerheadfistpunch]

I think your dealer or source for the Genuine Toyota caliper is milking you too much. The list price for a new Toyota caliper is about $404 a piece, with mud vendor discount, you should be able to get a new one for about $300. I remember I picked up the reman Toyota one for half or less few years back.

You can certainly try aftermarket reman caliper but I will shy away from Autozone, bought some reman caliper for my Accord and the damn thing was bent, wasted my time and almost screw up my other new brake parts!! Have you not consider rebuild the caliper with OE parts? That will be cheap.

This was what Kurt told me over the phone, I guess the drivers side ones were listing at $220 but the passenger ones where double that for some reason.

 

[hammerheadfistpunch]

That literally makes no sense. A caliper that is going to fail will leak fluid past the seals or past bleeder screws that aren't tightened down. It will be obvious that you have low or lowering pressure. Since calipers are usually installed with new pads and minimum thickness rotors - there isn't going to be a piston blow out and complete loss of fluid/braking power. Even with a leak at 1 corner you will still have some stopping power at the other 3 corners so long as there is fluid in the reservoir.... but a soft pedal will be obvious from the get go.


Amazon, Napa, and OReilly (& any other parts stores) most likely don't carry brand new calipers for our vehicles. It's too expensive to reverse engineer then build calipers... especially when they are pretty specific to something like a Land Cruiser, and in OE specification if it does match other vehicles, it's a select few. It isn't like a Ford where the caliper covers 10 years, 6 or 7 models, and there are literally millions of vehicles - where a company may stand to make profit from manufacturing "new".

What that means - is that the companies they source parts from get cores (from customers, junkyards, etc) and go through and rebuild them to OE spec using OE spec parts that you would/could otherwise buy to rebuild yourself.

Usually they come with a lifetime warranty....

I have new napa calipers on my 40 because it sat for 30 years (well, to be fair I think the front axle in it only sat for 10 years). Rarely have I needed to replace calipers on a Toyota (yes, I've had a lot of them).

I have a bad vibration and a burned through that rotor in less than a year, my only last guess is caliper stuck. I figured that they were oem hardware, but I guess what I didn't know was if there was a quality difference in the pistons and seals. some manufactures make a point to claim "metal pistons"...are some not? That seems crazy if they weren't. Anyway, sounds like any reman would be fine. I could also just get a rebuild kit.

 

[ranma21]

Following are the parts number for Genuine Toyota parts with dealer list price. Shows the same price for both sides. If Kurt is selling the new Genuine Toyota caliper for $220 for passenger side, that is a steal, you will not find it cheaper anywhere else. If I were to sell it that price, I will be losing money! LOL

47750-60061 $404.06 Driver side
47730-60061 $404.06 Pass Side

 

[ThomHart]

I was in a pinch and needed calipers quick. Piston was seized and when I finally got it out bore was scored. Got the AutoZone caliper and immediately rebuilt it with Toyota parts. This was a couple of years ago and it has been working fine since. Rebuild probably wasn't necessary but some of the components seemed a little "cheap" and I had a rebuild kit so what the heck.

 

[mechanist]

My reman calipers seem to be working fine. From Amazon. The overhaul parts are all available from rock auto.

The video I posted IIRC is the caliper rebuild video.

If it's your DD, like mine is, order the remans from Amazon and call it a day. They're the same ones my local Napa had in stock and for which there was a core charge.

If it's not your DD you'll be glad you saved the money by doing the overhaul. It's very easy to do. Plus if the Pistons respond just find to compressed air you'll then know the problem is further up the line.

 

[toyotaspeed90]

I have a bad vibration and a burned through that rotor in less than a year, my only last guess is caliper stuck. I figured that they were oem hardware, but I guess what I didn't know was if there was a quality difference in the pistons and seals. some manufactures make a point to claim "metal pistons"...are some not? That seems crazy if they weren't. Anyway, sounds like any reman would be fine. I could also just get a rebuild kit.

There's sometimes a variance between metal or phenolic - usually they get rebuilt with the same material.... so if factory was phenolic then they will replace with like. Sometimes when the same vehicle has varying brakes (example - a standard car may have smaller/cheaper components than it's higher performance same model brother) there will be a difference.

I'll put it this way.... I wouldn't guarantee that the sealing rubber is exactly the same "quality" between Toyota and non.... but keep in mind that Toyota doesn't make those parts, they outsource them as well. A good example - you can buy a Toyota branded oil pump that is also stamped "Aisin" or for about 1/3 (or less) the price you can outright buy an Aisin oil pump that doesn't have the Toyota branding on it.


A rotor vibrating means it's warped... that could be from the rotor or the caliper. A caliper that is sticky or sticking doesn't necessarily have to be replaced, and as others have mentioned, can be rebuilt. The caliper itself is made out of cast iron - so long as the fluid hasn't gotten so bad that there is massive pitting on the internal of the caliper to where the seals can't retain the pressure (and this is why cast masters will fail and Toyota moved to Aluminum pieces) then it can be rebuilt. Rotors can warp pretty easily..... if you have been hard on the brakes and then you stop for a long enough period with the hot pad against the rotor - that can warp it (this commonly happens when people track their car and then set their ebrake, if it isn't a drum style ebrake.... the hot pad will warp the rear rotor).

If you have a rotor that's warped AND the caliper is stuck or sticky these could happen:
1) you'll hear a rythmic noise where the warped part of the rotor is passing through the calipers
2) if stuck, after driving, you can literally feel a heat difference between the stuck and not-stuck calipers

 

[Kernal]

I installed reman'd Toyota front calipers for a 95 model into my 96 model FZJ-80. The 95 and earlier model FZJ front calipers are the same caliper that's used on 96-97 models. For some unknown reason Toyota only lists new calipers for 96-97 models.

 

[Heckraiser]

I have used a Vatozone caliper and my truck has not exploded yet.

Also, FWIW, the 3rd gen 4runner guys commonly run tundra brakes as an upgrade and the go-to caliper for the conversion is Vatozone--part numbers are even in the writeup on t4r.org. So it's safe to say there are a large number of these on the road and in the 4runner forums. I haven't heard any horror stories yet.

 

[greentruck]

I was in a pinch and needed calipers quick. Piston was seized and when I finally got it out bore was scored.
SNIP

This would be my concern and probably should be the OP's concern. Truck is torn down, you have a rebuild kit alright, but is the bore that the piston slides in going to pass muster? No way to tell without the tear down. If you actually need the new caliper?

Autozone is 2 blocks away. Just saying.

A lot stuff that is reman there is from cores, salvage, etc that was OEM at one time. Most of the reman work is done in Mexico. My only experience so far with the 80 was a new starter recently. Works great. OEM is what I'd prefer when the budget allows, but sometimes for practical reasons being 2 blocks away and open 7 days a week wins out.