[DeTomaso] Rear Brake Piston Rotation for e-brake tab

[clay willmott]

I had a little trouble with changing my rear brakes this weekend and thought I would share what I learned.
 
In rotating the rear pistons due to the e-brake I could not get them to compress easily.  I wondered it the direction mattered, or if I was off from the 45 degrees in the manual.
 
The I found some picture online as well as noticed in the manual (Blue for my 71) the pic shows the groove in the piston pointing directly at the bleeder valve.  I then turned both pistons to the bleeder valve and they both easily compressed EXACTLY pointing at the valve only.  Pointing the groove a little superior or inferior to the bleeder valve would not allow compression.
 
The direction of turning I used was counter clockwise to decompress the drivers side and clockwise for the passenger.  This is easy to remember as it is the least turning on either side to point at the bleeder valve.
 
The last person to install brakes on my car had erroneously placed both rear pads with tabs for the e-brake on the same side of the car!  So I had no e-brake help from the drivers side and the outside passenger pad was not seated properly.  They had NAPA plus some numbers I could not make out on them.  They were wearing uneven as the tab on the outside rear passenger brake prevented the pad from being pushed all the way in. 
 
Just thought this may help anyone new that is getting ready to change pads.
I used Porterfield GR4-s and complete front/back pads were $ 256.00 with shipping.
Ask for Wendy (At Porterfield) and she knows all about the piston/tab etc for Panteras.   
 
Clay
 
 
 
 
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