98 XC Brake Pad Change

[StoningtonXC70]

Took advantage of the spring weather here yesterday and did a front and rear brake pad change on the 98XC. Was probably the simplest change I've ever encountered on the vehicles I have owned over the years. The car had a complete brake overhaul a few years back by my local indie, who noted the pads were close to end of life a few weeks ago. Hardest part was breaking the wheel lug bolts loose to get the wheels off! I always end up using a 19MM impact socket on a long bar and have to stand on it to break the bolts loose.

Couple of observations:

The Haynes manual I have which is mainly a British V70 manual with not so great XC70 coverage does not cover the rear brakes correctly - shows a procedure for (I think) FWD cars that use small square pads vs the semi circular ones on the XC. I poked around the net including this forum but did not find a good tutorial on the XC70 specifics. If anyone knows of one, would be good to post for others. I did find one on Matthew's that was close and gave me the idea of how the rears worked. Short summary of what to do there is to remove two guide pin bolts on the inboard side of the caliper while holding the associated locknuts with a open end wrench, then the caliper can be lifted out in similar fashion to the one in front.

I was lucky I had a set of metric hex drives vs just the 7mm one sold by FCP Groton for the front caliper guide pins. The pins on the right side were 6MM! I suspect that caliper might have been an aftermarket replacement somewhere along the way, That side's caps for the guide pins were missing and the pins were kind of cruddy, but came out OK,and did not appear to be hanging up. Can those caps be obtained without buying a complete caliper rebuild kit? Not in FCP Groton inventory.

That same caliper was a dog to get fully retracted vs the others, which all went very easy. Was the last one I did of the four..wondering if I had extra hydraulic back pressure on that one, or maybe I need to keep an eye on it for binding. No tears in the boot, did not show any unusual pad wear vs the left front, and everything seems OK in the post change driving so far - no hot disc or uneven braking.

Ended up using original Volvo pads in front and PBRs on the rear. FCP Groton's local retail outlet only had Volvo and Mintex fronts in stock, was put off by low price of the Mintex pads relative to the other brands. If anyone has strong opinions on a better choice, let me know, they are easy enough to change!

In the event I end up doing a caliper change in front, is there anything special/unusual about bleeding the XC hydraulics? Will the standard two person push-and-bleed-rears-first-fronts-last-work? Do the caliper bracket bolts usually come out easy or are they problematic?

[JRL]

I don't care for PBR's they can make some noise

[StoningtonXC70]

So far so good re noise ...hard to see how those pads would squeal - pretty massive and they seem to float pretty well in the retainer grooves - never had a problem with squealing on this car, but my son's old 83 240 Turbo was bad for that. What do you think about the one caliper that was a tough one to retract?