Welcome to this weeks restoration. Today i am tackling the restoration of an old pair of STI 4 pot Sumitomo calipers for my WRX seeing as the Brembo's arent suitable for my goal ( Link here - • 25 Year Old Brembo Bra... ) So the plan is to fix the rust, clean up the castings, paint them, rebuild them and fit them to the car so lets crack on with the work.
First things first a visual inspection to check for defects or any major flaws that would render these calipers unsuitable for restoration and im pleased to say they are in good shape apart from being a little seized from sitting around for years.
The first job is to strip the old brake pads and fitting kit out this was simple enough and the pins weren't too seized. After the pads were out i set up my pressure regulator to around 50 psi and blew the pistons out with compressed air making sure there was wood in between them to cushion the impact as the pistons could chip and send dangerous shrapnel flying around the room.
After the pistons were removed i separated the two caliper halves with the help of my Snap-On impact gun then headed over to the parts washer to remove years of brake dust, brake fluid and general road grime this step is necessary to prolong the life of the blasting media and stop the blaster from clogging up with lumps of crud.
Once dry the halves were loaded into the blasting cabinet and given a good blasting this removed all rust and corrosion from the surface of the steel and left me with a pristine surface to paint onto.
After blasting i re-assembled the calipers so that i could grind away the rough casting marks left at the factory and smooth he calipers out so they would appear to be one single piece. This worked out successfully and allowed my to go to the next step which was as usual etch priming the surface preparing it for a following coat of high build primer.
The primer was left to cure them was wet flatted to give a flawless surface to apply my base coat red onto. Once the base coat was applied i made up some Subaru decals with my plotter and white vinyl and applied them in the appropriate location then gave them a good coat of clear to protect them.
While the clear coat was curing i set about re-plating the bolts as they were still in perfectly good condition all they needed was a little rust removal and a new coating of zinc and yellow passivate and they are good for another 20 years at least.
After all that it was simply a case of fitting new pistons and seals and joining the two halves back together with loctite and the correct torque this was verified by using my fully calibrated Snap-On torque wrench.
And there we have it one set of calipers all ready to be fitted and to do some serious braking :)
Which so you prefer the Brembo's or the Subaru's? Let me know in the comment section.
As always i hope you enjoyed this video and i'll see you again soon with another episode.
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#Restoration #Subaru #Brakes
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Subaru WRX Brake Caliper Perfect Restoration