I had sold rear brakes on a 2014 Honda Civic, and was taking the old rotors off when I ran into a problem. The right rear rotor was sticking on the hub and studs, so I had to hit it from the back side with a hammer to slowly work it off the studs. Usually they just pop off, but this was taking a lot of work to remove. Then one swing of the hammer missed.

One of my hammer swings missed the rotor and instead hit the brake caliper mounting ear on the rear spindle. And because it’s made of aluminum, it snapped right off when I hit it. I had the parts department look up a new one, and it would be a week away, but one of the local used parts suppliers could get us one in two days, so we went with that, giving the customer a loaner because this was our fault.

Two days later, a used knuckle arrives. And it’s for the front, not the rear. So we send that back, and wait for the correct one to show up. A few days later, a rear knuckle arrives, for a car with rear drum brakes, not disc brakes. The only difference is that it doesn’t have the caliper mounting ears, but that’s the whole reason we need a new one. So we send that back and the next day we finally receive the correct part. I had no problems installing it and getting the job wrapped up, but the used parts company doing a bad job cost us days.

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-Dan