Grand Cherokee Brake Shudder Fix (I think)

It's just the composite rotors from Jeep that failed, they corrected the problem by '02, probably still using composite rotors, but any twenty dollar cast iron replacement will fix the problem. Warrantee replaces both the rotor and calipers:

assembly (TB) and rotors were replaced by the dealer (under

Ditto. Got mine from Kolak. Expect them to last well over 100,000 miles, mine are still going strong and I just put on the second pair of pads a few weeks ago.

Thanks, :)

If you do the signals remember it takes quite a bit of messing around to get them right. I never protected mine apart from some rubber tape. A more permanant solution would probably be a coating of rtv sealant.

The LEDs do chalk with sun exposure, but the can be cleaned again with some flitz or simlar stuff.

DougW, question: If you use a 5v voltage regulator, why do you need the 200 ohm resistors? I dont get it. I've hooked up LED's using only 1K ohm resistors and they worked fine. Are the resistors necessary?

Thanks

The resistors are current limiters for the LEDs. Without them the LEDs would burn very brightly for a second then become a SED (Smoke Emitting Diode). :)

Actually you can drop using the regulator and just size the resistors for 14V. But since the voltage is hard to predict I dropped in a regulator. That means that even if the battery is a bit low, or a bit high, The signals will always be the same brightness.

The cheaper LEDs you see for cars either have a regulator in them or more commonly a limiting resistor.

When shopping for LEDs you are looking for the brightness (mcd) and viewing angle. The hardest part was figuring out the viewing angle so that motorist could see the signals. Still not sure I got it right.

This site has some useful info and calculators.

I went to Advance Auto, bought some Bendix higher end pads and Raybestos rotor for a lot less then cross drilled Stillen parts I am sure. They have been on the vehicle for 4-5 years and probably 70-80k miles or more. No brake issues. Before that the car would not go more than 10k mile without brake shudder. It is apparent to me that the DC stuff was just plain JUNK>

Sorry, Daimler didn't really fix the problem until half way thru '02 when they replaced the Teves calipers with Akebono and their bracket, silver in color, as pictured: