Well it only took about a month and a half to finally change out my rear drivers side brake rotor. It was completely rusted on and was killing me to drive with brand new pads on a grooved up rotor.

SOOOO I finally went out and bought a 2lb sledge hammer and decided that today was the day to get it done. And I decided to do a little write up for anyone else who is having trouble. The secret is (as everyone else has said) get a bigger hammer.

Start by blocking your two front tires, brake the lug nuts, and jack up the truck. With the tires blocked you can put the truck in neutral so you can turn the rotor. (DO NOT put on the Parking Brake)






Remove the two caliper bolts (10mm) and remove the caliper.



These are the grooves i was talking about from the metal backing of the old brake pads.



Now for the next part you may or may not need this but mine were very frozen on there so i bought some PB blaster and sprayed all around the old rotor. It may be a good idea to let it sit for a few hours or even a day or two to let it soak into all the rust.







Now it is the part you have been waiting for. Now bring out your trusty BFH, bend up the brake dust plate thing, and Swing Away!!!





If your lucky this will come off after a few swings. It took me about a half hour of hitting and turning the rotor. I then used some brake cleaner and got rid of some of the rust in the parking brake.



Heres a comparison of the new (Wearever) brake rotor i bought at Advance Auto Parts, like $50-$60, and the old rotor. I cleaned the new rotor with brake cleaner to get the oil and other junk that comes on the rotor when you buy it.



Now all that you gotta do is put the new rotor on the hub, bolt on the caliper, and bolt on the tire.

 

Good work man

 

Thanks man. I know its not really that big a deal but It was a pain in the butt.

 

Looks like it turned out well tho

 

wooo BFH FTW!

 

Another thing you can try is heating the rotor with a blow-torch. I did my brakes on Saturday and had good luck with that. Focus the torch on the hat section of the rotor (around the bolts) and heat as you hit it with a mini-sledge hammer with the other hand.

I didn't put it in neutral... just hit the rotor on the flange in hopes of spinning it back off the lugs (you will notice that the force of braking has jammed the rotor against on side of all the lugs... hit it in the other direction).

I also didn't bend up the dust/dirt shield... its there for a reason and I didn't want to damage it.

Oh... one more thing... after you take the wheel off thread the lugnuts back on to protect the ends of the bolts... you will probably at some point glance off the rotor and catch the lug. I didn't do this on the first one so I had to use a file to repair one thread.

And make sure you have some new rotors ready. This process dented the crap out of my rotors (they were already trashed though)

 

I am seeing a lot of these threads and its making me dread doing mine. Of course, mine are quite a ways down the road as they only have 9800 miles on them now. Not to sure I would take a torch anywhere near my studs though. Seems to me like you could ruin the hardening of the studs or change it in some way. I do have a BFH though.

 

Brake heat will get the studs 5X hotter than a propane torch nearby... as long as you don't directly heat them for like 20 minutes with the torch then you will be fine.

 

why is everyone talking about heating the rotor, or using penetrating lubricant? don't you know that the rear rotors are also DRUM's! for the ebrake, all you need is to adjust the self adjust screw at the bottom thru the hole in the back of the rotor shield, turne it until the rotors come out, then they will adjust or you can adjust them back once the new rotors are in, I just have replaced all 4 rotors on my 05 XLT 2wd

 

If only we all lived in the Utopia you live in... parking brake shoes holding the rotors on is the problem you find after you get past the rotor being rusted on. Then there's the adjuster being so rusted up it won't turn. Luckily most parking brake shoes also de-bond by this time and everything falls apart, yay.

I don't use the penetrating fluid though, sometimes the torches but usually just a large variable rate swing press.

 

My wheels! PM sent, please reply.

 

My parking brake was not holding. If that was the case, you either set the parking brake before you tried to take your rotor off or your parking brake was majorly rubbing while you drive and you should have incredibly hot brakes (and very low gas mileage)

 

No, ebrakes and regular drum shoes alway have slight friction on the drum, that is why sometimes is necesary to either tap the drum or back the self adjust screw to separate shoes from drums.
I didn't had a problem removing either rotor, but breakes don't get loose just because you heath them, actually heat EXPANDS metal and cold CONTRACTS so by heating it is not helping, penetrating lubricants can help on rusted parts, buy if the brakes are the problem is not going to help

 

wow, really? Heat expands metal??? shocking.

That is why heat helps. The rotor heats faster than the hub and therefore the rotor expands more. This expansion pops the rotor free from the bond of the rusted interface.

And properly functioning e-brakes will not contact the rotor. They are designed to pull back so they don't rub. Rubbing would cause your brakes to get very hot and reduce your gas mileage.

 

Hey, I don't want to start an argument about who's right, I could be wrong, I just never had problems removing drums or rotors on any of my past vehicles... I was just trying to help, as some people damage brake parts by warping them by beatting the hell out or exesive heat.
Just my .02 cents