Caliper Paint/Caliper rebuild

[Khronik]

3 of my calipers are leaking, 1 is pretty bad

think the previous owner spray painted them, some have both sides painted, some only have the front

is it safe to soak the calipers in say, paint thinner and remove all the paint?
and after do a rebuild on the calipers?

has anyone done a caliper rebuild using the Z1 kits and had any issues, would it be better to just grab some used calipers from Z1 instead of trying to remove the paint and rebuild mine?

[BigTDogg (MA)]

3 of my calipers are leaking, 1 is pretty bad

think the previous owner spray painted them, some have both sides painted, some only have the front

is it safe to soak the calipers in say, paint thinner and remove all the paint?
and after do a rebuild on the calipers?

has anyone done a caliper rebuild using the Z1 kits and had any issues, would it be better to just grab some used calipers from Z1 instead of trying to remove the paint and rebuild mine?

Do you have a compressed air source? If so, rebuilding your own calipers is super easy and took me an hour and a half for all 4. Get the OEM Nissan kits for the front, and the Centric kit for the rear. I don't think Nissan makes the rear kit any more.

I wouldn't soak them in thinner, and it wouldn't do much anyway. If you have access to a sandblaster, you can tape over the pistons and seal up the inlet and bleeder valves and blast the paint off. Other options are to just scuff it up real good after cleaning the entire thing with brake fluid, then spray with some compressed air and let dry.

The Eastwood Epoxy Caliper paint kit is great, just used it and loved it. It's a brush on kit, so you can be much more precise.

[zcomfort]

I would just get new ones. Its a pita. Z1 oem calipers are not rebuilt, straight of their junk cars. My reasoning for not rebuilding is your pistons/ seat could be warp, which means getting them ohmed $$, or new pistons $$$. You have to remove all seals before putting them in mineral spirits not paint thinner. Put them back together w/o the pistons being cockeyed which may be easier with new pistons$$$. Then torque the four bolt to spec. The piston boots are so hard to put back on. Do it if you think you can, its just cheaper to buy rebuilt calipers.

[sydwyZ32]

I would do the rebuild, caliper seals are cheap and pistons are cheap... for instance (i sell AP Racing big brake kits-thats my disclaimer) the price for replacing the pistons on an ap kit range from 15.00-40.00 per piston, if the OEM stuff is smaller and there are fewer pistons than I wouldn't imagine that the stock stuff would be far cheaper, caliper seals are about 30.00 per caliper for the AP kits as well (i can't imagine it would be anymore for the OE).
Calipers get rebuilt all the time, especially if your frying the seals working them hard at the track.
I wouldn't put the calipers in a solvent, just do a quick sand down on them, wash them off and paint with a high temp paint (better to get an actual caliper paint, that way when the calipers get hot they won't start fading color)

[zcomfort]

Im telling you front caliper pistons cost aveage 30 to 50 dollars a piece and rear I've seen at $125+

[Ace2cool]

There are only 12 pistons left in the dealer system as of 3 months ago, and they want $45 apeice. Besides, as long as they're not scored or scratched, they'll be fine. Use a scotch brite pad to clean them, using WD-40 as a solvent. That'll get just about anything off of them. Good luck, man.

[BigTDogg (MA)]

Then torque the four bolt to spec. The piston boots are so hard to put back on.

See, that's the thing, there is no spec for the torque for the four fastening bolts. They say "DO NOT REMOVE" or something in the FSM.

IME, the piston boots weren't that bad.

[Ace2cool]

Yeah, the boots were really easy for me. The retaining clip made it infinitely easier. I rebuilt a Toyota's brakes, and it was just a groove holding it on both ends. Popped off continually.

As far as the bolts, I just made them strongarm tight. I went hard, but not to the point I felt I was going to break anything.