Why are my brakes shuttering?

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LT 562

LT 562

Joined
Aug 21, 2016
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Location
CA
I have this pulsing upon application of the brakes and I can't figure out what it is. It's only while braking.

I've resurfaced the rotors along with new pads. I've also then replaced the rotors. I've replaced inner and outer wheel bearings. I don't get the vibration at speed so I don't think it's the wheel or tire or balance. I highly doubt I bent an axle, but again only while braking. I can't get rid of this warped rotor like issue.

Any help or guidance would be much appreciated. Thanks!
 
Could be the type of material used on the brake pad which could be deposited on the rotor. I would try some some of the high-end company's products versus OEM. When the brakes get hot, for example exiting the freeway, hard braking and then immediately stop for a traffic light keeping the brakes applied could deposit the material. What will help is after the stop let the vehicle slowly creep forward so the pad doesn't stay in one spot. Sometimes when I think the rotors are really hot I just shift into neutral and take my foot off the brake when possible may using the handbrake. Learned the technique in some of the sports car forums years ago.
 
Does it happen all the time, or mostly during light braking?

If it happens when you're gently washing off speed, or if you're coming in slow to a red light, or approaching a stop., then my money if in loose front wheel bearings.

How are you setting bearing preload?
 
ppc said:
Could be the type of material used on the brake pad which could be deposited on the rotor. I would try some some of the high-end company's products versus OEM. When the brakes get hot, for example exiting the freeway, hard braking and then immediately stop for a traffic light keeping the brakes applied could deposit the material. What will help is after the stop let the vehicle slowly creep forward so the pad doesn't stay in one spot. Sometimes when I think the rotors are really hot I just shift into neutral and take my foot off the brake when possible may using the handbrake. Learned the technique in some of the sports car forums years ago.
Click to expand...

A few hard stops in quick succession to get the rotors hot can get rid of this.

Something like hard braking from 55mph down to 20mph, speed up again, repeat several times in quick succession.

Be aware of brake fade if you do this
 
I first resurfaced my rotors and used new Toyota Pads. Then I switched over to brembo rotors and Hawk LTS pads. I'm very disciplined with proper bedding process and don't ever come to full stops, even during normal driving I slow to a rest in neutral when possible.

Shutter can be felt under light and heavy pedal application. Yes, I've tried to scrape the rotors with very hard breaking from high speed, usually in the dead of night.

Bearings are tightened down and set, then adjusting nut / preload is roughly 4 ft/lb, lock nut at 47 ft/lb and fish scale pull reads 7-8 lbs.

No abs light with shutter. But abs system and light does work.

Thanks for all the great feedback. I would love to figure this out. In between the rotor/pad changes I replaced the booster with the Toyota / Cruiser Corps unit and rebuilt my master cylinder. The brakes were amazing and I was shocked how dangerously poor they've been all the years before. Then somewhere along the way they just started this weird shutter.

I should also mention, that the modulation can be felt through the pedal - more or less with amount of brake pedal force applied.
 
Last edited:
take some runout measurements on the rotors, if it's more then .001 then remove the rotors (rear) and measure the hubs.
 
LT 562 said:
I should also mention, that the modulation can be felt through the pedal - more or less with amount of brake pedal force applied.
Click to expand...

Several times I've had a brake shudder occur with one of my landcruisers.
Shudder felt as feedback through the pedal and the steering wheel.
Most noticeable under light braking,.but not exclusively.

Everytime, mine has been due to loose wheel bearings.

I no longer follow the FSM method and DO NOT use a fish scale.

There's heaps written here about alternative methods of setting wheel bearings that are repeatable, reliable and proven.
 
mudgudgeon said:
Several times I've had a brake shudder occur with one of my landcruisers.
Shudder felt as feedback through the pedal and the steering wheel.
Most noticeable under light braking,.but not exclusively.

Everytime, mine has been due to loose wheel bearings.

I no longer follow the FSM method and DO NOT use a fish scale.

There's heaps written here about alternative methods of setting wheel bearings that are repeatable, reliable and proven.
Click to expand...
Yes, I've gone through those posts and have used various methods through the years. Before I would tighten down, turn around a few times back and forth, loosen then hand tight, then another quarter turn with ratchet. That would yield ~10 lbs on pull scale. I thought maybe it was too much preload and went with the next most recommended method, which is using the FSM.
 
TheBussman said:
take some runout measurements on the rotors, if it's more then .001 then remove the rotors (rear) and measure the hubs.
Click to expand...
And yes, I haven't touched the rear ever. So that is also a potential next stop.
 
LT 562 said:
Yes, I've gone through those posts and have used various methods through the years. Before I would tighten down, turn around a few times back and forth, loosen then hand tight, then another quarter turn with ratchet. That would yield ~10 lbs on pull scale. I thought maybe it was too much preload and went with the next most recommended method, which is using the FSM.
Click to expand...

If you come up short on another solution, I'd suggest a rethink on your methodology here.
 
Bearing preload of 4 ft/lbs is way to low. Like others have said, leave the fish scale in the tackle box. At minimum 20 ft/lbs on stock sized tires. Big tires, then that figure jumps to 30. Start the process going high to seat the bearings several times, rotate forwards and backwards, back off, then set to final torque. Bend over the safety tabs one towards the inner nut and another on the router nut.
 
ppc said:
Bearing preload of 4 ft/lbs is way to low. Like others have said, leave the fish scale in the tackle box. At minimum 20 ft/lbs on stock sized tires. Big tires, then that figure jumps to 30. Start the process going high to seat the bearings several times, rotate forwards and backwards, back off, then set to final torque. Bend over the safety tabs one towards the inner nut and another on the router nut.
Click to expand...
25 ft/lb is what I had it before this last round. Believe me when I say I'm not married to any of these methods and have tried several.

The fish scale is just a data point, not what I aimed for.
 
LT 562 said:
The fish scale is just a data point, not what I aimed for.
Click to expand...

ToolRUs (well known cruiser mechanic, and contributor on mud) did some experimenting with the fish scale.
His finding was that when using modern lithium greases, fish scale readings are unreliable, unrepeatable and have no correlation to bearing preload.

This matches my experience. I started out folliwing the FSM method with my shiny useless fish scale, and had loose bearings after a could of thousands miles, more than once.
You can torque the adjusting nut to 45lb, and feel no discernible difference in effort reqired to rotate the hub at 45lb than the effort required to rotate it when torqued to 10lb.


Good description of preload method here

Spindle Damage Cause? - https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/spindle-damage-cause.1345370/

But if you use search, or better yet, use Google to search within ih8mud for "bearing preload" "bearing torque" "bearing adjustment" etc you'll find lots of discussion on this
 
Outsane said:
Also check if your tierod ends are in good shape.
Click to expand...
Thanks, good suggestion. I did notice alignment has been off since about the same timeframe. All steering components are maybe 3 years old but maybe something happened last time I wheeled over this past summer.
 
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