Neto

I'm thinking that driving style (and traffic conditions, of course) must have a lot to do with it. We have an 09 with stock rotors. Very adequate stopping power, and no warpage. We do live in a very small town, don't often drive in heavy traffic, and I, at least, am very light on the brakes. (My wife tends to use the brakes more than I do.) We have had the car for several years now, and have just over 55,000 on it. I did just replace the rear pads a week or so ago. I don't know about previous service, but it was the first time I've had to do anything with the brakes.

Very few people rebuild master or wheel cylinders anymore, but we used to always go the rebuild route, unless the walls of the bore were too pitted to hone out. But if the fluid level is staying up, and the pedal drops, but you can build pressure by pumping it, then the fluid is bleeding past the piston inside the master cylinder. It can be as simple as a piece of dirt, or excessive wear on the bore, or degredation of the cup. I am possibly making a lot of assumptions here, because I have not rebuilt a master cylinder since about 30 years ago, on a 72 Dodge Coronet I had back then. I have not had a master cylinder go bad since, and the honing stones on my hone have fallen off, so I doubt if I'd do it now anymore, except on an older car. On the 72, as I recall, the fluid level was going down fast, but there were no external leaks. It was leaking out of the master cylinder into the power assist chamber, and being sucked into the carb by the vacuum system.

One comment regarding topic titles - Topic titles that do not describe the specific problem, or at least in general terms, such as "Ignition-Starting problem" are not helpful, because the reader must open it and read through a bunch of garbage just to find out what it's about. Also, if the thread does have valuable suggestions or a final solution documented, it can be found much more easily and quickly in a forum search.

Oi! Eu morava em Porto Velho para 17 anos, 1986 ate 2003, e em Forteleza e Brasilia antes disso. Temos que fazer uma visita este ano para manter nosso residencia permanente, mais a cidade 'ta sofrendo aina da alagacao. Nao sei quando nois vamos la.

Thanks for that link. I read through the whole thread, and it sounds very interesting. Just as I was starting to wonder if the larger systems would fit inside the 16" wheels, the question was answered, that you have to have at least 17"ers. Our Journey is the 4 banger, and maybe it's because of the lower weight, or just my driving style, but I've not noticed what I would consider poor braking. But then my first car was a 62 Chrysler Newport, and it DID have poor brakes. (Of course it was also 15 years old when I got it...)

I guess I have been lurking on this forum for so long that I didn't remember that I hadn't joined, so did now, so I could post. This was my first encounter with these brake pistons that have to be screwed back in. (The C-clamp got tight, but wasn't going anywhere - I found out about the special tool from this thread.) What are the advantages of that supposed to be? First I've ever seen that, or even heard of it. (Most of our vehicles are old, I guess.) I also noticed that some have said that the newer Journeys have larger disks (our is the first year model) - has anyone tried to upgrade to the later model brake assembly on an 09?