HELP! 308 Brakes LOCKED!

I recently bought new 17" wheels from SL Competition and mounted new tires on the rims. Rolled my 84 308 GTS (euro) out of the garage, put on the hand brake and mounted the new wheels. Last to go on were the fronts, which I noticed spun a bit as I torked the nuts down with my electric B&D impact driver.
Released the jack, took away the wheel wedges, started the car, released handbrake, put in reverse and NOTHING, Car will not budge.

Jacked up the rear, both rear wheels locked.

1. Wiggled the handbrake lever under the engine and WE40'd it to death, it turns easily on and off,
2. At each wheel, levered the handbrake actuator arm, this seems in the most "off" position, against the "off" side pins.
3. Rear wheel brakepads on both sides show sliver of light between pad and rotor but outboard pads are smack-tight to rotor. Slight tapping with screwdriver between pad and rotor yeilds nothing.
4. Pumping foot brake reduces sliver of light noted in 3 above to nill and upon release of foot brake, light reappears.
5. Wheels do not turn the slightest.

WHAT IS WRONG?? The car easily came out of the garage before I did the wheel change. Could I have warped the rotors by overtightening the wheel bolts?

Please respond!

Quasimotor

 

Remove the new wheels and see if the rotors will spin. The wheel might be pushing the caliper into the rotors.

 

Oh, I took both wheels off long ago. Still no spin. No budge and inch, either.
Thanks.

Quasi

 

The lug bolts are different lengths front to rear. Maybe you "squished" something. Have you pulled the calipers (or can you?).

 

Oh, NEVER NEVER NEVER use an impact driver for your wheel bolts. Well, for pretty much anything for that matter!

 

The hand brake has a control mech on the caliper. It is adjustable via an inset gear mechanism under a allen-headed plug. Try loosening the mech and see if the rotors will turn.

 

If the rear wheel lug bolts extend too far into the wheel hub, jammed parking brakes or broken pieces will keep the wheels from turning.

 

Well, there it is I bet... I knew the lugs were a different length for a reason.

 

If the rear wheel lug bolts extend too far into the wheel hub, jammed parking brakes or broken pieces will keep the wheels from turning.
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Is there any way to correct this mistake or are the rotors ruined?

Q

 

The rotors are probably OK, it's the caliper that may need rebuliding and/or replacing, as the park brake mechanism is inside the caliper.

However, I'd take a good look to make sure that you didn't just jam or put just enough of a dent in something to cause things to bind. It may just need a hammer tap, or a bit of careful filing to resolve.

Had the same problem when I replaced my 390 TRX rims with Superformance 16" rims. Luckily I use a socket to hand tighten the bolts & as soon as I got a bolt too tight, I couldn't turn the wheel by hand to bring the bolt where I wanted it. In my case, the rear bolts were almost the right length, 3 of the fine were OK, & the rest were slightly too long. So I chucked them in my lathe & parted off 0.5mm from the shortest ones & about 1.5mm from the longer ones so they were all the same length. Put a thin film of prussian blue on the bolt ends, hand tightened them with the socket, verified they weren't contacting anything. Then torqued one down, checked again, torqued them all down, then pulled them & checked a 3rd time.

 

As usual, you guys figured it out. Turns out SL Competition sends one bag of bolts, but two diffferent lengths. Short on the back, long on the front. A few of my back ones were long. I can see bright metal scrapings at the back of the holes. Looks like that the extra impact torquing didn't help either. I'm thinking of sending this into the shop, but do any of you have a procedure for removing the caliper (do I have to bleed the lines for this) and checking where the damage lies. Either way, if I don't do more harm, the mechanic can pick up where I left off.

Quasi

 

Hi George
Download the shop manual from http://dino308gt4.com and take a very close look at page G2 (section of the rear suspension). The boldt s will have bottomed out on the hub itself (The shop manual shows the cast iron upright, the aluminum one is fatter near the bearings.)

Either you moved the disc away from the hub or you shifted the hub and its bearings (and thus the disc). Either will result in the lack of gap between outer pad and disc, gap between disc and inner pad.

You should release the pressure by undoing the outer pad adjuster (13mm wrench to loosen the nut, then allen key to move the pad away.) You can then see if the disc moved away from the hub or not.

Gerrit

 

Okay guys - thanks for all the good info. I found three long bolts on each of the rear wheels. Changed these to shorts and the wheels spin find with no noise. Went for a 3 mile ride, no noise, everything working normal. Came back, checked the torque (72 ft/lbs) and everything was still tight. Am I good to go, or do you suggest readjusting the calipers?

Quasi

 

If the parking brake also works OK, then I'd say drive it a while & keep an eye on things.

 

The parking brake works as good as it ever did, which is to say, not much.