W124 - Brakes Overhaul and Bulbs Replacement

While getting the brake rotors and pads replace earlier (click here to read), the mechanic advised that it would be good to have the brakes serviced, the work would include replacing the brake fluid, new brake hoses, and the caliper rebuild kit to remove worn-out seals on the calipers and at the same time regreasing all moving parts properly.

I did not have this done earlier as we did not have the brake hoses available for replacement and the job would take half a day. I took this opportunity to also have the brake hoses upgraded to stainless steel made by Probrakes Germany (exact part purchased here). An order was placed on 1st Mar 2021 and I received the shipment 5 weeks later. The delay was contributed by the COVID-19 situation where most delivery hubs are busy.

Why stainless steel braided hose you may ask? I have no real reason, but from the little that I have checked, this specific one comes with TUV and DOT approval, and apart from that, it claims to provide improved feedback, give better haptic on the brake pedal, and also the braking distance is reduced as the hoses will not expand, however, this is debatable as many a time, the replacement rubber brake hoses (which has some steel or kevlar or other material built-in) does that exact same time when it is new and many of this hoses have lasted well to up to 20 years of use. I did not want to grab attention to the hoses and hence went with the oldtimer look. 

To further plan this job, I have also ordered the following:

  • Wurth Multipurpose Rapid Brake Cleaner
  • Wurth Brake Anti Squeal Spray 
  • Wurth Brake Paste

Coming back to the brake job, what will be done are:

  1. Flush brake fluid
  2. Remove Calipers from the wheel hub
  3. Removal of the brake pads from the calipers
  4. Removal of all seals from the caliper followed by properly cleaning them
  5. Remove brake hose
  6. Check and ensure that the pistons are free to move with applied pressure
  7. Lubricate all moving parts
  8. Add new seals and reassemble the calipers
  9. Fit new steel braided hoses
  10. Fit calipers back
  11. Clean brake pad and apply anti-squeal spray
  12. Reattach brake pads
  13. Fill new brake fluids and bleed the system to ensure no air bubble and brake are biting as they should 
The mechanic started removing the brake parts from the car. First observation, the old brake hoses were already overdue for replacement. The hoses had cracks on the outer sleeves and others are already cracking. The hoses normally last a long time and in this case, they lasted over 26 years.

Next, the front left brake calipers were partially jammed. They were mildly engaged even when the brakes are not applied. This made the car mildly pull left when in motion. The calipers were then disassembled and cleaned before being blow-dried. Once all the calipers have dried, new grease was applied for the calipers to be put back together with new seals. The lubricant used is the Brake Paste from Wurth that came in a 5.5g sachet.

The complete calipers are now mounted back to the wheels and the brake pads were prepped with Wurth Brake Anti Squeal spray. Once that was done, we bled the brake lines and flushed out the old brake fluid, replacing them with the original Mercedes brake fluid. There are many schools of thought on how often brake fluid should be replaced, having been riding big cc bikes, I used to flush my brake fluid every 15,000 km on the bike and my brakes were always sharp and crisp. I plan to have my brake fluid replaced every 20,000 - 25,000km on Rhino. They are not too expansive as well.

The first observation after completion of the job is Rhino glides smoother. I am guessing that due to lesser resistance from the partially jammed caliper, the fuel consumption should improve as well but that will be something to monitor. The brake squeal was also gone as well.

Another fix I did today was to replace the bulbs on Rhino. All the bulbs are due for replacement as they are no longer bright as they should be. I have opted for the main H4 bulbs and the H3 fog lamp bulbs to be replaced. The bulbs of choice are:
  • H4: Osram Night Breaker Laser - 60/55w
  • H3: Osram Fog Breaker - Yellow - 12v
The Night Breaker is something that I have been using on my wife's car and I like the extra light that these bulbs emit, while the fog lamp was to have better visibility and attention during rougher driving conditions and to add some personal touch. It was a whole day out but satisfying to have complete the key objectives of the day.

Pictures:

The Probrakes brake hoses in Old Timer style - stock looking setup

Old brake hoses and caliper seals

Broken insulation on one of the hoses

Cracked insulation

Another broken insulation on the brake hose

Rear calipers with pistons removed

Front caliper cleaned and ready for assembly


New bulbs installed - Osram Night Breaker Laser

Fog lamp in action - Osram Fog Breaker

Picture darken to capture the color of the fog lamp

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