1. Make sure the car is in park and the engine off and for added safety, engage the emergency brake
2. Loosen lug nuts by turning counter clockwise(because you can't remove the wheel without jacking the car up and you if you do this after jacking the car up, you'll just be spinning the wheel rather than loosening the nuts, make sense?)
3. Jack car up so that wheel is no longer touching the ground, and don't jack up higher than necessary(place the jack near the wheel you are working on and be sure that you place the jack on the metal frame and not the plastic body. There are usually notches to indicate which you can see in the photo above and to the right of the jack. If you are still unsure, check the owner's manual - which you should keep in your glove compartment)
4. Remove lug nuts and remove wheel (you should be able to do this by hand since you should have broken the resistance to the nuts in step 2)
5. Remove bolt behind brake caliper* and rotor to release caliper assembly (mine was on too tight for me to loosen by hand so I lightly tapped with a mallet).*do NOT allow the caliper to hang by the brake lines, have someone hold it or better yet, rig a holder using some wire to secure it. If you break the pressure seal on the brake fluid, you WILL get brake fluid everywhere. Your face, your clothes, the ground, tools - everywhere.
6. Remove brake pads from caliper, inspect*, and clean using brake cleaner
(warning: this is highly stinky stuff, spray over a bucket and have some rags nearby to wipe dry)
*if your brake pads appear worn, this is when you would replace them. At this point, just pop out the old ones, and insert the new ones.
7. Remove old rotor* off wheel bolts, (if the rotor doesn't come off easily, tap with mallet or gently with a hammer - it's ok since the rotor is metal)
*if they appear to be in decent condition, hang onto them and have them "turned" at a garage (where they grind the surface so the groove is gone) so you don't have to buy next time, or to have spare part on hand
8. Open new rotor, and place on wheel bolts
Left: new rotor on wheel bolts, right: old rotor (which actually isn't very old so that's why we hung onto it)
Read part 3 here.
(warning: this is highly stinky stuff, spray over a bucket and have some rags nearby to wipe dry)
*if your brake pads appear worn, this is when you would replace them. At this point, just pop out the old ones, and insert the new ones.
7. Remove old rotor* off wheel bolts, (if the rotor doesn't come off easily, tap with mallet or gently with a hammer - it's ok since the rotor is metal)*if they appear to be in decent condition, hang onto them and have them "turned" at a garage (where they grind the surface so the groove is gone) so you don't have to buy next time, or to have spare part on hand
8. Open new rotor, and place on wheel bolts
Left: new rotor on wheel bolts, right: old rotor (which actually isn't very old so that's why we hung onto it)
Read part 3 here.
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