My 88 gl wagon's front pads were down to about 1/16" of friction material, so I got me a set of them thar new pads and new rotors. Put it all back together and now the calipers have "floated" outboard to the point that they scrape the stock 13" wheels. I put a washer over each wheel stud to space them out (about a 16th of an inch) and it is enough to relieve the scraping, but that is not a good fix, has this happened to anyone else, and what could I have done wrong?

My 88 gl wagon's front pads were down to about 1/16" of friction material, so I got me a set of them thar new pads and new rotors. Put it all back together and now the calipers have "floated" outboard to the point that they scrape the stock 13" wheels. I put a washer over each wheel stud to space them out (about a 16th of an inch) and it is enough to relieve the scraping, but that is not a good fix, has this happened to anyone else, and what could I have done wrong?

I had the same problem after replacing the disks and pads. I didn't measure the thickness of the disk, but suspect that the fine Chinese replacements I used are thicker than they are supposed to be. You might try painting the calipers then looking where paint gets rubbed off by the wheel; use an angle grinder to take off a little material at the rub points. I did this, and it worked for me.

 

- James B

'85 4WD DL wagon

'01 2WD Nissan Frontier

'95 Casita FD

That is a good idea I will give that a try tonite. New question, is it possible that I have EA-81 wheels? They are black steel 13x5 I think. When I got the car it had 8 spoke enkeis, not even close to a rubbing problem.

You could have EA81 wheels on there, and maybe with the pads worn and the caliper farther in they didn't rub.

check here....

 

differences

http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/80s/wheels2/wagdiff.jpg

 

ea82 style

http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/80s/wheels2/wag8589.jpg

 

ea81 style

http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/80s/wheels2/wag84.jpg

i think snowman might be on to something.

I'm gonna measure that backspacing today, and see if that is indeed the problem. Thanks for the input!