FROGBOX

Have you looked lately? Those same 235/55-19 tires are now $193 each at Discount. The 225/55-19's are $154 each. Big difference. It used to be the case that the 235's were cheaper as there was much more selection. There were only a few options in the 225 size, so they tended to be more expensive.

The factory Kumho's are 99H, so these are a step up. Same speed rating, but slightly higher load index. I just can't get over the tradwear rating of 145,000km. I would be happy to get half that. Getting mine installed today. Even though there are cheaper options Statesdie, I like the fact I can go to any Can Tire across the country and get free flat repairs & rotations every 10k.

Yes. 2011 can go as low as 16" if you want. They have the smaller brakes. 2012 and newer need minimum 17" wheels.

The stock 19" tire was an oddball size (225/55-19) with very little selection when it came to replacement options. I just saw a Yokohama YK580 in the stock size at discount tire for $154 each. This is new as I have been searching for tire options for a few months now and have never seen this before. Something to think about when deciding on a new tire instead of going to the more common over size of 235/55-19. Link to tires

For our Canadian forum members, I stumbled upon a great deal for 4 Continental tires in the 235/55-19 size. They are on sale this week (buy 3 get one free) bringing the price down to $172.50 each with FREE installation. Regular price is $230 + $20 installation. So you are saving about $350 after taxes on a set of 4. Plus, these tires seem to be highly rated. They are low rolling resistance and super long tread wear rating at 145,000km!!! I was going to get new tires when I go to the States in December, but these are a fantastic deal right now. Even cheaper than Tire Rack by a long shot. And the free installation is almost a $100 value. With the high tread wear rating, these may be the last tires I ever put on it. http://tires.canadiantire.ca/en/tires/all-season-touring-tires/product/0052304P/continental-truecontact-153-/3021001/ Free installation coupon: http://s7d5.scene7.com/is/content/CanadianTire/Driver2014springCoupon_4_Epdf

Just be ready for the high probability that you may also need new wheels to clear the calipers. I doubt the stock Journey wheels will clear. You will need either some factory SRT wheels, or aftermarket wheels. You could also try spacers to get the clearance.

What year is his Journey? If its an older Journey (early 2012 and older), it has the small brakes and the wheels should fit? If it is newer and has bigger brakes, you will have to find some Journey wheels, or go aftermarket. I bought a set of 18" wrangler wheels in the Fall that I wanted to use to mount some snow tires and they didn't fit over the brakes (link to thread). I have the bigger brakes. The offset was too high and the spokes of the rims were hitting the caliper. Journey wheels have a +40 offset. Jeep wheels are +44.5, so they sit further inside by 4.5mm and have a greater chance of rubbing. A smaller offset means they poke out more. As far as tire size goes, you can go wide, but not tall. The Jeep tires are too tall and they will hit the suspension. You need a low profile tire like a 55 or 60 series. The rim width on the Jeep is 7.5" meaning it can handle tire widths between 225 & 265. So for an 18" wheel, these are the 3 sizes that will be closest to the stock size: 225/60-18: 235/60-18: 245/55-18:

The 255's are only 30mm wider than stock. So 15mm on either side of center. I don't think rubbing will be an issue with only 15mm of extra internal width. I Have narrowed it down to 2 possibilities The first is the Yokohama YK580. They are a brand name that is reasonably priced. They have a low rolling resistance for better fuel economy and a treadwear rating of 60,000 miles. They are also V speed rated which is higher than the H rating recommended by Dodge. Option 2 is the Yokohama Avid Envigor. Also a reasonably priced brand name that is also low rolling resistance and great treadwear. It is also V speed rated. Both are similarly priced at about $200 each plus tax & installation with current rebates available. YK580: Avid ENVigor: The cheapest places I have found for tires this side of the border are www.pmctire.com and www.tireset.ca Tireset seems to be cheaper, but charge for shipping (about $20 per tire) while PMC is more expensive, but ship for free to Ontario. They work out very close in the end. http://tires.pmctire.com/ent/yokohama-avid-envigor-255-50r19-107v.tire http://www.tireset.ca/yokohama-avid-envigor-h-or-v-speed-rated-255-50r19-107v-high-performance-all-season/

That is a smoking deal. And an awesome offer to grab them for a member. Thanks DTSGUY!!! Someone snap these up.

Another thing that can cause a pulsation in the brake pedal is a concentrated deposit of pad material in one spot on the rotor. It acts like warped rotors, but its a patch in one spot that grabs, so every time it passes under the pad, it catches and makes for a less than smooth slow down. The biggest cause of this deposit is hot rotors and standing at a stop with the brake on. The pads are made of various materials, but use a resin to bond them all together. That is how the pad material keeps its shape. If you do a long hard brake, like slowing down from highway speeds on an off ramp, and stop at the end of the ramp with your foot on the brake waiting for the light, the heat in the rotor can melt the resin in the pad and deposit it in the one spot on the rotor. A good practice is to either coast to a stop if safe to do so, or release the brake after a hard stop and allow the vehicle to slowly roll forward with light pedal pressure so the pad is not sitting on one spot on the hot rotor.

Yeah, the stock size is a joke. 225/55-19. Very few other vehicles with that size, meaning they are not a common size, meaning more $$$ That is a great price for 4 tires. Myself, I am going with a 255/50-19 tire. It is the stock size for many SUV's including the BMW X series, Mercedes M series, Acura MDX, etc. Common size means a higher volume produced resulting in cheaper prices. You get more tire for less money vs the stock size. There are also way more choices on brand & model.

I did some searching. If anyone is serious about trying the Brembo brake upgrade, it can be done for half the price for all 4 corners with used calipers and aftermarket (powerstop) pads & rotors from the previous generation Grand Cherokee SRT-8. The Powerstop kit is K2867 and sells for around $400 + shipping A set of used calipers from a 2006 (fits 2006-2010) is around $650 on E-bay: Canada: http://www.ebay.com/itm/360923345717 US: http://www.ebay.com/itm/271471597911 I have no idea if it will work or not, just throwing out what i found.

Grand Cherokee SRT brakes would be way cool. 6 piston calipers on 15" rotors up front and 4 piston calipers on 13.8" rotors in the rear. Now that would stop you in a hurry. BUT, I don't know if it would work off the shelf. The wheel bolt pattern is the same, so no need to change hubs. The rotors should fit. The spindles (knuckles) however, are very different between the 2 models. Unlike our vehicles with floating calipers, the SRT calipers bolt right to the spindles (no brackets required). Since the calipers have multiple pistons on both sides, they do not need to float, so can certainly be bolted in place of where the slider bracket would go. The question is, do the the bolt holes line up? If not, It's certainly possible to have some custom brackets machined. I compared the part numbers for the brackets between our Journeys and the Grand Cherokees and they do not match. that doesn't mean the bolt holes are different though. Even if it does fit, it will NOT be cheap. The calipers are around $300 each. OEM rotors are around $200 each. Total parts cost to do the upgrade on the front alone (if it fits) is over $1100. If machined brackets are required, add another couple hundred. Here is a breakdown of the part numbers for the front: Left Caliper - 68146611AA - $291 Right Caliper - 68146610AA - $300 Rotors - 05181513AB - $204 x 2 - $408 Pads - 68144427AA - $105 Shims - 68144779AA - $32 The rears are ever so slightly cheaper by about $10 as the rotors are a bit smaller. So around $2200 for a complete SRT Brembo brake upgrade. On the plus side, brake pad replacement would be super simple. Here is a picture to drool over:

Yep. If the pedal drops to the floor, there is a leak somewhere. If there is no obvious signs of an external leak from either the master cylinder, any of the brake lines or calipers, the leak is internal in the master cylinder. If the reservoir is still full, that means its not leaking out. Probably an internal seal let go Here is a thread from another member with the same problem. He never did report back an update? http://www.dodgejourneyforum.com/topic/5436-dodge-journey-crd-rt-2litre-diesel/

The earlier Journeys had undersized brakes, but had a different (softer) compound brake pad. The older pads gripped better, giving the brakes pretty good stopping power. But the problem with the older brakes were rapid heat build up due to heat soak. The smaller the rotor size (mass), the quicker it absorbed the heat. The older pads were also VERY dusty and wore out quickly. When they changed the late 12's to bigger rotors & dual piston calipers, they also changed the pad material to ceramic. The ceramic compound typically doesn't grab as well, but it lasts longer and is a much lower dust producer. Perhaps Dodge thought the increase in brake size and the decrease in pad grip would offset each other and the braking feel between the 2 would be similar??? Anyway, if you want better grip, you could simply swap the pads for a different compound, like a semi metallic pad. It will grab better, but they won't last as long, will wear out your rotors faster, and will make your wheels dusty. Its only $60 for a set of pads, so pretty cheap to try it out. Just make sure to bed them properly for best performance. EDIT: I couldn't find much in the way of aftermarket pads for the 2014 models that are not ceramic. Raybestos make a hybrid pad - part number EHT1589H

There are some aftermarket systems on Ebay that include the bigger screen, GPS, video, etc. I can't comment on the quality, but the price is 1/3 of an OEM system. http://www.ebay.com/itm/121246833366

Been there....done that. My first set of front brakes were replaced at the dealer under warranty at 20k due to pulsation in the brake pedal caused by warped rotors. The second set started doing the same thing around 40k. instead of replacing them with the same crappy parts, I decided to upgrade. I installed larger brake components that come on the newer Journeys. They are still OEM parts, but since they are larger, they are stronger and not likely to warp any time soon. The rears were worn out at 40k. I replaced them with a set of power stop rotors & ceramic pads. My brakes should now last well over 100k. The easy solution to the problem is to install a quality set of aftermarket parts and they should last for years.

Brakes are covered for 1 year, or 20,000 km. There was an extended warranty issued for the 2009-2010 models due to frequent brake issues in the early models. It was basically doubled to 2 years, 40,000km. As far as I know, the warranty was not extended for the 2011 or 2012 models, even though they have the same parts??? Late 2012 and newer Journeys got bigger brakes which seem to have cured the very common brake warping issues of the earlier models.

Ouch. $350 for one hour of work. Brakes are not that hard to do. Its a simple remove & replace procedure with a few extra steps to clean mating surfaces and lubricate moving parts. The only trick is getting the rear caliper pistons to retract. You need a special tool that costs about $20 at Harbor Freight. I can do a 4 wheel brake job in my driveway with a floor jack, one wheel at a time, in about an hour. In a shop with a hoist, I bet he took less. Anyway, as long as you are happy with the result, thats all that matters. At least you don't have to worry about them anymore.

Brakes are not part of the basic warranty. They are only covered for 1 year or 20,000 km. He is out of both.

Very common problem. Firstly, I think most vehicles are sold with soft brake compounds from the factory. It does provide better braking, but the trade off is increased brake dust & shorter pad life. The rears also wear prematurely if they are not serviced regularly. By that I mean removing the components to lubricate the moving parts and sliding surfaces. The rear brakes on my 2011 were worn out at 40k too. When i removed them, the pads were stuck in place by rust buildup under the stainless steel shims. I had to pry them out of the brackets when they should pull out easily by hand. The pads are supposed to be able to slide freely. If they are stuck in place, they don't back off the rotor fully and wear down faster. If you really want to get maximum life out of your brakes, you can upgrade to bigger pads & rotors. However, this also means bigger calipers and carriers, so its not cheap. But the parts are readily available and makes for a good upgrade to the braking system, which IMHO, are too small for the weight of the vehicle in the first place. I upgraded my brakes and am super happy with how they perform.

Good luck finding one. There is so much information for vehicles these days that paper copies would have to be the size of several telephone books. So much easier to get it in electronic format and if you need a hard copy of a specific procedure, just print those pages from the .pdf so you have them handy in the workshop.

Another option....For $15, you can buy an electronic copy from Ebay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/151247438383 Pay the $$$, then get an e-mail within 24 hours with a link to download the .pdf.

If you like to work on your own vehicles and just need a little guidance, there is an online manual from Chiltons that should have diagrams & instructions: http://repair.chiltondiy.com/Pub/DIY/Product.aspx?ca=Repair&b=96947 Cost is $15 for a 30 day subscription, or $25 for a full year.

True, but even thought I was super happy with the longevity of the tires, I have never purchased a set of Michelin's since then either. So quality does not always mean more business. Michelin's are great tires, but very expensive. I am a middle of the road kind of guy. Don't get the most expensive, but don't cheap out either. Especially when safety is concerned, as is the case with tires. I'm going with Yokohama based several factors......tire tread life, low rolling resistance, reasonable price, and by reading reviews on tire sites from actual users of the tire. I didn't even consider Michelin's due to the higher price.