The dilemma- what do we do with our belongings during our 6 week cross-country trip. Moving our things into storage requires us to move things twice and we still have to fork out money to rent a box truck in the end. The solution- buy a box truck and use it as a storage container while we are on our first trip; then, return to California and drive the box truck (pulling the BMW) to North Carolina.
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This is how she looked when Drewrolled into Rancho Cordova CA for a test drive. The seller had failed to inform him that he was a chain smoker but otherwise, the truck was pretty much as described. The brakes made an awful grinding noise and Drew could see that the outside pad on the passenger side was warn down to the indicator pad. After spending 6 hours at the DMV, Drew had made the sale and left for Palo Alto at 8pm. Luckily, he didn't hit any traffic and really didn't use the brakes until exiting 101 onto San Antonio Road. By the last stop light, he had lost pedal pressure and was using the engine and E-brake to stop. He still can't believe how lucky he is to have made it home without a major catastrophe. The next day,Drew embarked on the challenge of removing the wheels to examine the brakes (not an easy task without a 1" high powered impact driver. Using a 4' piece of back steel pipe as a beaker bar, he finally managed to get the wheels off.
This is what he found: |
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| The inner brake pad was non existent and the grinding sound that he had falsely identified as a wear indicator, was actually the caliper pistons pressing directly against the brake disc. |
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| Axel with rotor, caliper and hub removed. |
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| Kelly getting excited about owning a box truck! |
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| Half packed up! |
