[RPM]

Who ever heard of such things? I thought I had all of the parts to do the rear brakes, new rotors, pads, and sensors. No such luck. Luckily my local shop has some on hand that I can pick up in the morning. Most online parts sources do not even list the darned things!



They are mentioned in Vol III of the factory manual - when all else fails, read the instructions.



Edit/Update: The PET only shows them on the front brakes. I found them on the rears. Anyone know if they are required or necessary in back?

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[sasilverbullet]

I had them on the back, and they're still there <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/smile.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[rustech]

Ralph, if you do still have them on the rear, you can reuse them by applying some anti-rattle gue between them and the pads. The gue is about 3 bucks at the local autostore.

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[RPM]

anti-rattle glue - good to know. One pair was no longer usable. I'll check the others.

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[sp4149]

[quote name='RPM' post='30039' date='Jan 19 2007, 07:40 PM']Who ever heard of such things? I thought I had all of the parts to do the rear brakes, new rotors, pads, and sensors. No such luck. Luckily my local shop has some on hand that I can pick up in the morning. Most online parts sources do not even list the darned things!



They are mentioned in Vol III of the factory manual - when all else fails, read the instructions.



Edit/Update: The PET only shows them on the front brakes. I found them on the rears. Anyone know if they are required or necessary in back?[/quote]

These things are in there to reduce brake noise, I found out the same way when I did the front brakes this summer. On the front calipers there are two different sizes and a couple of the on-line Porsche parts places listed both sizes, they aren't cheap, cost almost as much as the pads. I found several posts on them and it was obvious that the "track guys" don't use them as they defeat the quick change design of the calipers.

I just removed them, prying them off the pads while stillin the calipers, stripped off the old goo, wire brushed off the rust and corrosion, resprayed them with an anti-sqeal brake goo (ugly red color) and installed them. Using the anti-squeal junk definitely makes this a messy operation, but since I was replacing rotors as well I wanted to do as much renewal as I could. I was using different pads that are supposed to be dust-free and quiet so I can't say if I really needed the shims with the new pads.

It would have been much faster to either have new shims or skip them, but after I broke one of the sensors, I wasn't going to finish that Saturday anyway, so letting everything cure overnight didn't really delay things. BTW I used J-B Weld to patch the cracked sensor, filing in a new mounting flange into the J-B-Weld, and it's still holding.



-sp4149

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[RPM]

Job is done. New rear rotors, pads, sensors, and shims. Sourced new shims from my mechanic and installed all around. They were not cheap @ nearly $40 for the rears. Each caliper took a 28mm on one piston and a 30mm on the other. This type were self-adhesive and so the glue issue was avoided.



Another great support effort from my shop, European Performance in Raleigh, NC. When I called last night they offered to install all of my parts for just $80 labor. I decided to finish myself (of course I already had one brake apart) and stopped by the shop this morning. They took the time to explain how the shims fit and gave me a few other tips. Great guys. Of course they have gotten a lot of my money on other jobs <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/blink.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[Darryl]

I too found out about the shims the hard way. The fronts also have two different sizes but they aren't the same as the rears. When I first acquired my car, I was going to do all four sets of pads, but upon inspection, the rears looked almost new, so I left those alone. I did find out that the PO (or shop) didn't install shims on the rears as they were missing and the fronts were a mess. The shims did quiet the rear brakes down significantly. I used OEM pads but will be switching to something less dusty next pad change!



- Darryl

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[RPM]

After lots of reading and discussion I went with PBR deluxe pads. Made in Australia, land of sunshine and sharks! (could not resist that old Monty Python joke) I'll be watching for dust and listening for sqeaks and reporting on the outcome. I hope I chose well...

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