I would appreciate it if anyone could put forward a reason for this happening, or indeed support the garages claims.

I left our Chrysler Voyager with the village garage, I have used for years, for an MOT. It needed drop links outer roll bar bush's and two dampers at the front ( inherited the car from my dad, who lived in a town full of speed bumps, so so far nothing unexpected). They called while it was being fixed to say the front pads were nearly worn through, so gave ok to replace. When I got it back I used it for about a week, before one morning when I was heading to work I braked as I came up to some lights, the pedal felt like it popped then sunk to the floor. I pumped the pedal and seemed to get pressure back but as I tried to turn right at the lights there was a medal on metal banging coming from the front nearside (very loudly) before the nearside front wheel locked up solid. I managed to free it up by reversing for a couple of feet but when I went forward it locked solid again. I'm a bit concerned about this as it happened 500 yards from the M5 and a few minutes later I would have been driving at motorway speed quite possibly in the outside lane, which wouldn't have had a Disney ending.

The garage came out to the car while I was at work and fixed it, they claim that a piece of stone/metal had jammed between the pad and disc and that is what caused the problem. They have changed the pads because they were damaged and handed the keys back. They now want paying for the repair and another set of pads. Now I don't mind paying for work that's been done well, however I've always gone by the theory that if something doesn't make sense it isn't right.

My suspicions are:

Could a trapped stone caused a wheel to lock solid enough overcome the fact it is being pushed by a very heavy car at about 20mph.

This left no marks on the disc.

It happening so soon after they had the brakes and suspension stripped down.

The mechanic who handed the keys back to my wife is normally a good honest bloke, he looked guiltier than a vicar caught up to his spuds in a choir boy.

Any theories advice welcome

 

Don't worry problem solved.....the garage didn't tighten the wheel nuts up

 

yes off course it was the problem of loose nuts.

 

I don't believe this at all. I don't think it was loose wheel nuts because I actually caused something like this on my Taurus, not my Town and Country. Let me explain and can give you a way to check.

I changed the pads on the front of my 01 Taurus. A month or so later I decided to try and install new strut assembly's on both sides. I watched a you tube video on a supposed shortcut to install the new struts. Well, it didn't turn out to be as easy as described and after a lot of struggling trying to get the first assembly on I decided to put the old one back on and call it a day. During the attempts to put the new assembly on I was putting a lot of force on the brake caliper and disc using my feet trying to get/keep strut to line up. In the process, unknowingly at the time, I torqued out the bolts that hold the caliper on. After a test drive I noticed dsome weird noise from the front driver side and especially during braking. When I got back I looked under hte car and noticed one of the caliper bolts hanging halfway out. So I naturally assumbed during my work and loosening/tightenting of bolts that I did not tighten that bolt. I tightened it and for a few days nothing unusual. I drove my family 200+ miles to visit family a week or so later. While visiting the family we were driving down the road, I gently applied brakes to slow while a vehicle pulled onto the road in front of us. All of the sudden there was some load clanking and then lots of jerking and clatter from the front, we pulled over. As soon as the vehicle came to a stop, I could not drive more than maybe 10 feet and the car would lock up completely. I could throw the car in reverse and drive forward again ten feet or so before complete lockup.

It turns out we lost one bolt from teh caliper and the caliper was slapping up against the inside of the wheel. Fortunately we had a strong alloy wheel and all it did was grind it at high speeds and not cut right thru it or destroy it sending the wheel off completely. When I would back up, the caliper would get knocked back over the brake disk and after driving forward a few feet would launch back into the wheel locking up the car.

Long story short, a new bolt and some red thread locker solved the problem. I got a new wheel because the inside of the wheel was damaged pretty good. It was scored pretty heavily.

That's my suggestion to make sure what happened to me did not happen to you. If it was the caliper then it would have left some damage of some sort on the inside of your rim. It was easy to see the damage on my rim. Depending on your rim type, you might have to remove it from the vehicle to check. Anyway, from now on I apply threadlocker to all my caliper bolts if I remove them on any vehicle to replace pads etc... Better safe than sorry.

 

Thanks for your reply Alex

I thought the cause would be a loose bolt on the calliper as well, however I took the car to another garage and we had a good look at it. We found rub marks on the calliper and corresponding damage on the inside of the wheel (which looked suspiciously like someone had rubbed oil and dirt into the damage. Bearing in mind the garage that went out to recover the car was the same garage that had done the work).

So far so good to support my theory, the fact that they had had an opportunity to put right the original cause was looking like a problem in terms of complaining about things. However I asked the garage to mark the damage with a paint pen because we were using the car over the holidays to cover a fair few miles, before I would have a chance to take the car back to the original garage for them to inspect again, the mechanic was shining a torch at the inside of the wheel when all became clear. The bolt holes on the wheel had threads scored into them. Which when you think about it doesn't make sense when you are sliding the wheel onto studs and then tightening with a collared nut?. What had happened was the nuts hadn't been tightened and as the came loose the wheel was resting against the studs hence the thread marks. We took a torque reading from the opposite wheel which had obviously been removed and replaced at the same time, and found that the nuts had been tightened to between 80 and 85Nm's. They should have been tightened to 135Nm's !!!

The owner of the garage (who I have used and trusted for more than ten years) is away at the moment, it will be an interesting discussion when he gets back!