I was a little surprised that there was no How-to on changing brake pads, unless I overlooked it. Anyway, I found a few how-to's on other websites and wanted to know if they would work on my protege5. I liked this one...

http://www.edmunds.com/ownership/how...7/article.html

But it says that it's for the front brakes and I want to change the rear brakes. Will that guide work or is something different. I'm guessing it'll be fairly self explanatory and a rough guide will work, but I don't want to chance it with brakes.

One thing I don't get though, is the usage of the C clamp. I see that you need it on other sites as well, but I don't get how. from what I get, you have to use it to spread out the piston so the new brake pads fit. If that's it, than I just don't get how a C clamp would open it. Is it soemthing that I will figure out when I see it or should I not chance it.

THanks a lot.

 

To sum it up, for the front all you need to do is remove one bolt on the bottom backside of the caliper with an allen wrench, and that will allow you to pull the caliper open and expose the pads. Swap the pads, and retract the piston with a c-clamp. When you open the caliper and remove the pads, the piston comes out as if the brakes are fully engaged. You need to use a C-clamp to retract the piston back into its' orriginal position (check the end of this How-To to get an idea of what the C-clam is used for.

Now for some reason when I was changing the back ones, I wasn't able to open the caliper and simply swap the pads like on the front, but had to take off the whole caliper and install them that way. But, it is possible to open them just like the front ones (picture on page 23 of protege5.ugly.net) .. I just think mine were rusted stuck or something. If you manage to get yours to slide open, then it's just as easy as the front .. but you have to use an allen wrench to retract the piston (no c-clamp for the rear -- page 25 of protege5.ugly.net).

Check the manual at http://protege5.ugly.net/04-11.PDF on pages 19 and 23 & 25 to get a better idea of what I'm talking about. It should help a lot.

 

Also found this How-To for REAR pads .. but it looks kinda messy. It might help, but I think the protege5.ugly.net manua should be plenty helpful. Let us know if you encounter any snags.

 

the rear pads don't retract with a c-clamp like the front ones. You actually have to turn the piston back into the caliper. You can do this one of two ways. Either take a pair of needle nose pliers and grab onto the piston and rotate it (I can't remember which way is in..I believe it's clockwise). Or you can take the cap off the back of the caliper and there's a allan/hex key bolt that spins the piston back in.

 

Okay. Thanks guys. I'm waiting till monday so I can pick up the jack from UPS. If it's not too cold, I'll take care of it this week.