Battery terminal covers?
Battery terminal covers?
Damn! I should check out the fluid in my CSRT. The one thing that I've been disappointed about with this car is the factory brakes. They've pulsated since it was practically new. And the brake dust is insane. I've had the stock rotors resurfaced, but it came right back after a few hundred miles. I have new rotors and Hawk HPS pads ready to go on, but my plate is overflowing with old school stuff.
Meanwhile my SL which had all new brake lines, 11" setup, 24mm MC and filled with DOT 4 10 years ago is still practically crystal clear in the MC. It still looks new even though I'm going to bleed the ---- out of it since it's been sitting since '09.
Looking forward to that CSRT upgrade experience Adam!
I wondered about that myself, but O'Reilly's has them for like $4. So I bought them as added insurance...
I also need to figure out my battery hold down. The stud for my clamp just spins with the nut. I bought $5 kit from O'Reilly's, will either use that, or figure out a way to fix the stock setup...
If you pull off the battery tray you'll see the stud for the battery hold down under it. I've put a jam nut on top to prevent spinning before.
Brake dust was maddening on mine when I got it, and I hear it's a common problem for many SRT cars. The same went for my wife's Fiesta ST; Ford put some aggressive but notoriously dusty pads on the ST line. It didn't help that the previous owner had put on some EBC YellowStuff pads on the front of my Caliber. I swapped the brakes on the Caliber out out for some Centric extreme service ceramic pads and some slotted front rotors from Rock Auto and took the car out to properly bed the brakes. I cannot stress that enough. That never happens with new cars from the factory, and rarely happens when people put new brakes on their cars. But it makes all the difference when it comes to brake performance and brake dust. I went from washing my wheels 2-3 times a week to every other week, and the braking power improved immensely even over the aggressive EBC pads. When it came time to put brakes on my wife's ST we chose Power Stop pads and Raybestos rotors, followed the same procedure, and got the same results. Now I've upgraded the Caliber to the StopTech kit that included pads, hardware, and slotted/crossdrilled rotors for all four corners. So far I love them.
I know I know. I've got the dyno sheets sitting right here next to the computer. I just haven't had time to do the full write up with everything else I'm trying to do to the car before SDAC. We just put an upgraded clutch in on Sunday (huge thanks to Jeff Mass) and I just picked it up from the tint shop this evening. I'll get to it.
Yup, been there done that. Worst case, I think the battery tray out of my GLHS has a good hold down. Shoot me a PM and I'll bring it along to loan you for the weekend.
I've not tried pulling the tray yet. Is the stud welded in the front frame rail on the G-body like it is in the L-body? If so, that's part of my issue. I can't get the nut off the stud to get the clamp out & remove the tray to fix it.
Rained last night, so no work got done... Hoping to look into it tonight...
I think it is. I just did one on Joy's Daytona a few weeks ago.
Got it fixed last night. Turns out that stud is on an L bracket bolted to the inside of the front frame rail, so it was relatively painless to get out. Mine was toast, so I cut the head off, and replaced it with a carriage bolt, so the battery is now securely held in the car. Looks like I stopped all my leaks last weekend, so all I have to do now is install the terminal insulators on the battery, and I should be good!
No problem man, I'd be scrambling to get ready if I could go. Right now I'm trying to decide on wether to tackle the Spirit R/T or CSRT next. It'll be nice to see your take on the upgrades since I have similar upgrades sitting in a big Rubbermaid tote ready to go, and I don't exactly trust what those cookie kids at calibersrt4.net think.