Bit the bullet on Cardone reman calipers...

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Given the shaky reputation Cardone has, I was a little hesitant but decided to give it a go.

Got two Cardone reman calipers from their ultra line with the powder coat on it. Box is nice and fancy, when you open it up it has a card facing you that talks about how impressed you'll be with their ultra premium calipers.

First caliper had the piston boot installed incorrectly, not seated on the piston and actually twisted/pinched against the body of the caliper with a rusty looking piston as well. The boots for the guide pins were seated into the bracket but not the pins. Okay. The caliper guide pins were ugly looking too, clearly not new.

Second caliper looked fine from the piston boot and guide pin boot side, the plastic cap on the inlet port that they brag about on their description (they claim it protects the threads) was missing and instead the banjo bolt was threaded in there. Kind of weird since the first one had the plastic cap. Piston looks scratched to [censored] from whatever blasting they did to it but at least there's no rust this time. C-clip for the piston boot was slightly out so I had to push it back in. Pulled the bracket and noticed the guide pins were brand new unlike the first, noticed they put two of the same guide pin when they were supposed to have two different guide pins. The one with the bushing on it was missing.

Had RockAuto cut me a refund for the amount it would cost to replace the guide pins and had them replace the other one. I hope the replacement is not as bad. I have to admit this makes me wonder how the things I can't see like the other side of the piston and the square cut seal are. I find it kind of hard to believe their quality control could be this bad.
 
Why am I not surprised? I think the way to go with reman parts is to buy them local so you can actually look them over. Even that is no guarantee with the lousy quality these days but its a start. It might cost more but could end up being a time saver if you need the vehicle "yesterday."
 
Originally Posted By: HangFire
I love Rock Auto, but demarpaint is right, for some refurb items it's best to buy local and look them over first (and avoid Cardone).
i think cardone is the only game in town for calipers. All i have ever seen anyway
 
Originally Posted By: Chris142
Originally Posted By: HangFire
I love Rock Auto, but demarpaint is right, for some refurb items it's best to buy local and look them over first (and avoid Cardone).
i think cardone is the only game in town for calipers. All i have ever seen anyway

For rebuilt. There's always dealer options, and online dealers. Sometimes, when your life is on the line (brakes), and there are no good rebuild options, just buy new OEM.

Maybe it's time for some Public Shaming: https://www.facebook.com/pages/A1-Cardone/330162340357112
 
Yeah, I too have had only marginal success with reman Cardone Brake Calipers. Often the bleeder screw is stripped or the anti rattle spring(mazda/ford) were broken off inside the caliper hole(s) therefore, not being able to put the spring into the hole and had to drill out the hole(which Cardone reman facility should have inspected & performed). This one I just bought last week(mazda3) was OK.
 
Hm, well, that makes me a little nervous about my caliper that I replaced a year and a half ago. I got the Ultra Cardones as well, hoping to get the better end of the Cardone remans.

What makes me nervous is that since I'm just an amateur, I may not have noticed any of the issues like you did. I'd imagine a lot of home garage guys may not either. I did check and silicone grease the slide pins since that's a known issue. At least, it's been working great for about 18 months and 20,000 miles.
 
I musta hit the parts lottery when I bought stuff for the Rat. I bought a set of re-manned calipers from Auto Zone. The calipers cost me 16$ each and my calipers as cores. I bought a cheap set of pads and have had no further drama. All the brake and clutch parts came from Parts Geek. Parts selection was mostly price driven. The heavy stuff was bought at the local AZ to avoid shipping. Only splurge was for a LUK rep set. I bought a new starter for 48$ from Amazon. It was almost too pretty to hide on the Rat. Works as good as it looks.
grin2.gif
 
BBB/King Kaliper does calipers too.As do Raybestos,Centric,Dorman new and others....
 
LOTS of competition in the reman caliper business. With the intense competition on price, and part number proliferation, makes it very hard to the reman to make a profit. Quality can suffer, some care more than others.

Rod
 
I bought Raybestos remans for my wife's Corolla assuming they would be a slightly higher quality but I had nothing but trouble with them. The Cardone-reman'd Wearever calipers from Advance fixed those problems. Take that however you will...
 
Originally Posted By: Bottom_Feeder
I bought Raybestos remans for my wife's Corolla assuming they would be a slightly higher quality but I had nothing but trouble with them. The Cardone-reman'd Wearever calipers from Advance fixed those problems. Take that however you will...
What kind of problems?
 
With reman items that have a core charge, I prefer to buy local in-store* because of return shipping to Rock Auto.

*For the purpose of this post and buying reman parts, in-store also includes their respective online sites (eg autozone.com) since they let you buy online and return in-store

Napa Eclipse is the same as Cardone Ultra, except the coating is black instead of silver.

Originally Posted By: HangFire
There's always dealer options, and online dealers. Sometimes, when your life is on the line (brakes), and there are no good rebuild options, just buy new OEM.

Maybe it's time for some Public Shaming: https://www.facebook.com/pages/A1-Cardone/330162340357112


even the dealer "OEM" rebuilds are done by Cardone
 
Originally Posted By: HangFire
There's always dealer options, and online dealers. Sometimes, when your life is on the line (brakes), and there are no good rebuild options, just buy new OEM.

Originally Posted By: slacktide_bitog
even the dealer "OEM" rebuilds are done by Cardone

Sometimes, such as GM. Some marques do not sell refurb calipers at all. Anyway, that is why I said "just buy new OEM."
 
Originally Posted By: HangFire
Originally Posted By: HangFire
There's always dealer options, and online dealers. Sometimes, when your life is on the line (brakes), and there are no good rebuild options, just buy new OEM.

Originally Posted By: slacktide_bitog
even the dealer "OEM" rebuilds are done by Cardone

Sometimes, such as GM. Some marques do not sell refurb calipers at all. Anyway, that is why I said "just buy new OEM."



Thats not always possible. Lots of manufactures simply don't offer new calipers.
 
A while back I bought some Napa Premium reman'd calipers. They are painted/powerdercoated black. If it is paint it is a very hard paint.

UNfortunately this black paint/powdercoat was thick and was impeding the ability of the caliper to move properly on the ways. A bit of time with a file and some wetsanding to fine grits sorted that out, but I suppose many would not notice or bother, and would likely end up with a sticky caliper and perhaps tapered noisy brake pads.

From reading this thread, I guess the Napa remans are Cardone. I've not had any issues with the calipers, but the brake pads did have issues with backing plate/friction material separation, but a few macro photos of the failure emailed to the manufacturer had them send me a new set free of charge, and I am quite confident in my brakes again, that at one point I considered anemic and unsafe.

I believe the previous calipers I installed were from Pep boys and the core charge was actually more than the calipers, so When I returned my previous calipers I got more money back than I spent. They had not failed when i replaced them with napa reman's, but I was just in the mood to start from scratch and start with what i perceived to be the best available parts, right or wrong as that perception may have been.
No New calipers available for my vehicle that I am aware of.
 
Originally Posted By: NoNameJoe
Originally Posted By: Bottom_Feeder
I bought Raybestos remans for my wife's Corolla assuming they would be a slightly higher quality but I had nothing but trouble with them. The Cardone-reman'd Wearever calipers from Advance fixed those problems. Take that however you will...

What kind of problems?

The passenger side (which I installed and test-drove first) was fine, but the driver's side is when I started running into trouble.

The slider pins were 'hydrolocked' with grease which pushed the piston off the pad after each stop, requiring more pedal travel and causing a rattling noise when off the brakes. Disassembling them and greasing them properly helped but did not completely fix it.

Also I suspect they were the wrong calipers to begin with. Going just by eye when I should have actually measured them, the piston on at least one of them (driver's side) seemed slightly larger than the Wearever/Cardone reman I bought which would also explain why there was more pedal travel and a 'wooden' feel. No amount of brake bleeding on three different occasions improved that issue. Simply replacing the Raybestos caliper and bracket with the Wearever/Cardone equivalents and a quick bleed made the problem go away. No more rattle, no more long pedal, no more wooden feeling. The car's brakes were back to working like they should if not better.

Having a quick chat with the guy at Advance as I returned the not-even-year-old Raybestos reman for the core, I told him how happy I was that the Cardone seemed like a quality reman and worked great. His reply was along the lines of, "We don't hear that very often".

My only beef with the Cardone caliper is that the banjo bolt threaded into the caliper at bit more firmly that what normally would feel right, but it worked fine with no leaks afterward.
 
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