QuestionI own a 2001 dodge Grand Caravn and had the wheel cylinders and a brake job done at the end of 2006.I then had the wheel cylinders replaced again on March 22,2008 and the brakes cleaned up.I just brought my car in and had the rear wheel bearing replaced and was told that I needed to have my wheel cylinders replaced because they are half seized and my break pads are scored due to this,only about 30,000klms of useage. How long should they last and what should the company do to rectify this problem, are the parts mabey defective. Same company did all the work.
As for my stabilizer bars they were replaced on april 28,2007 and one again on july9,2008 only 27,659klms of use. First time replaced by the same company as the cylinders but second time by another company just because it fell apart right infront of there shop. How long should these last
Answer The only possible reason that the brake cylinders could have failed this many times would be if you were in the habit of frequently driving through standing water up to or past the wheel hubs. I would be very suspicious of the quality of the work being done by your chosen shop. You should have them explain in detail what went wrong and why, 'cause it just ain't right. Sometimes wheel cylinders will fail from over-extension due to misuse of the parking brake. The parking brake should be applied almost every time you park. It's easy to get out of the habit with an automatic transmission, but the parking brake mechanism is also the mechanism that adjusts for wear in the shoes. So, if you don't use the parking brake, the shoes wear down, allowing the pistons on the cylinders to extend past the point at which they were designed to stop. then, they either seize up, or they start to leak. But, in a front wheel drive mini van, the rear brakes should last a very long time (over 50,000 miles) unless you habitually carry a heavy load in the back of the van.
I don't know about this stabilizer bar business. The stabilizer bar, which is commonly referred to outside of the parts books as an anti-roll bar, is just a dumb piece of steel that should never need to be replaced. The bushings in which it is mounted can fail, as well as the links at the ends of the bar that connect it to the suspension. But, the bar itself should only need to be replaced if it is bent in accident of some kind (it could happen on the lift in a shop while doing a brake job, but that would require a degree of incompetence that is almost beyond belief). However, I noticed in my research that some of the purveyors of commonly required replacement parts do sell this bar for your vehicle, so there may be some factor that causes failure in this particular van that I have not run across yet.
