Heya.. long time reader.. first time poster here .. have a quick question about my stock '96 Geo Tracker 4wd.

I gave the vehicle a front brake pad/rotor change last week.. and since then I had noticed a lot of rubbing on the drivers side.. enough so that the entire wheel assembly would get hot to the touch.  Having noticed the caliper was a bit tough to collapse during the change, I figured it was just shot and holding the pads onto the rotor.  After going to autozone and buying a new caliper.. I went to pull the old one off.. and noticed even with the caliper off.. there was still pad rubbing.

I tried to back the pads off a bit.. but they did not want to move.. it ended up requiring a bit of force just to back them off so the rubbing ceased.  I pulled both pads completely off and cleaned the tracks with wd40 and a wire brush.. but the pads still refuse to go on easily..  Am I wrong or aren't brake pads supposed to have some play when they are on the vehicle so they do back off on their own?  Did I just get some defective(too wide of a backing plate) pads.. or did the assembly somehow get damaged?  The passenger side with pads from the same kit does not experience this rubbing.. and as I drive the vehicle daily for deliveries.. having that kind of heat generated on the hub is not an ideal situation.

Thanks in advance for any tips..

-Zack

The new rotors that you bought, are the vented, or unvented?
They could have given you the 4-door vented rotors by mistake.... which are wider than the 2-door un-vented rotors.

BTW - nice looking zuk

They were the unvented .. I managed to get the rubbing to stop by removing one of the retainer clips on the side.. for some reason the pads just would not go on right with both of them there.. even after cleaning and a bit of sanding to get the rust out of the way.   I am hoping that I won't run into any problems by doing this .. after driving all afternoon on my deliveries I had no problems, aside from the lines still needing bled.. so maybe it'll be fine.

And thanks.. my tracker isn't anything special .. but I do try to keep it semi-clean looking.. planning on a suspension lift and some larger tires possibly.. doubt it will ever see a lot of offroad action as much as I'd like to tho.. nowhere to really offroad in the area.

I used to have a 1987 Samurai and after owning one I fell in love with the little "jeeps" and can't stand driving anything else.. unfortunately it developed some problems I didn't have the resources to take care of and picked up the tracker cheap from a buddy.  It was like going from a chevette to a cadillac in terms of comfort, power and handling.. as much as I loved the samurais.. I doubt I'd ever give up my tracker for another.

Ive noticed some brake pads arent stamped out exactly right. I take a sanding disc to the part of the pad that fits in the slide and shape to fit.

Mike