Please help on my oem brakes
 

So my car is making a weird noise from the front left (like a slight rubbing/scrapping) when braking or when driving. A mechanic checked my brakes and found that my rotors are starting to go. He mentioned that i still have some more life on them but the sound will just get worse and eventually i will have to replace it..

Im running the OEM brakes and pads & car is at 30k.

Not looking to spend too much money as i barely use my car now but when i go on mountain drives i push the brakes hard.

I found this http://www.ft86speedfactory.com/stop...l#.WUK0iRiZM0o

Would that be good enough? Im in between the stop tech or the hawks, have not buy brakes before so im just looking for some input. Thanks.

imo no, I wrote something up on the reddit that I'll link here. OEM blank replacement rotors are like ~$170 for a full set, stoptech pads on their own are like $130 for a full set, the rotors in that kit are overpriced and the stainless steel lines aren't useful for a DD so you're overpaying by about $200, and you still need to buy brake fluid.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ft86/commen...th_it_for_500/

I'm skeptical your rotors are shot, I've got 60k miles on mine, 5 track days, ~3 seasons of autox, I put over 30k miles on the stock pads (2x track days, about 1 season of autox) and they still have life left but I roasted the pads so they weren't gripping well anymore. If it's a brake pad dragging what needs to happen is the caliper slider pins need to be cleaned and regreased, maybe an hours worth of labor, a pad and rotor swap without cleaning the pins would make the noise worse and wear out the new equipment faster.

See if someone will do a kit with a quality brake fluid like Motul, stoptech pads, and centric premium blank rotors. The slotted rotors will be of no value to you, and the stainless lines offer a very minimal improvement until you've got lots of miles on them.

The stoptech components are very good, I personal run their street performance pads, and I'm very happy with them.

Your rotors are shot at 30K? That sounds sketchy given how you say you use your car. My first thought for the dragging noise was a pebble stuck in the dust shield, but presumably even that mechanic could spot that.

Interesting, wouldn't a pebble loose itself? Been like that for about 1 month.

That would account for one but both sides at the same time would be beyond coincidence.


Not a hope in hell rotors would be gone but pads still OK after that few miles. Any chance you can get a picture of at least the outside visible parts for us? I doubt the mechanics diagnosis. Even if they were in some way damaged that would be a symptom not a cause.

Thanks yes i know something is not right and i cant find what it is. Im at AZP installs in jersey right now, hope they can figure it out and finally b over with this issue

AZP are good people. They'll figure it out.

it could be hub/dust shield that touching rotor? check that out

Most likely caused by the pads moving around slightly and touching the no wear ridges at the outer and inner limits of the pads as they wear the rotor. Modern asbestos free brake pads wear rotors quite aggressively. I note that the rotor surface rusts quite quickly if you do not drive regularly. That causes the rotors to wear a little faster then if you drive regularly. Rust can also make noise but only for the first brake application or two after the car has sat for a few days. Not likely your front brakes are worn out just yet even if you drive like a maniac, these are light cars with big front brakes for their size.

Rotors are designed to last only for about one set of pads with a bit of extra thickness to allow for variation in braking habits.

Seizing calipers make a knocking sound and you can feel the rotor runout through the brake pedal as well. It is unlikely your calipers are seizing at this young age.

I recommend you brake harder than you are accustomed to, at least a few times a month. This will help reduce brake noises

"Rotors are designed to last only for about one set of pads with a bit of extra thickness to allow for variation in braking habits"
Really? You are not into business selling brake disks by chance? :)

https://www.yourmechanic.com/article...otor-disc-last

I highly doubt your rotors are bad. Shady shop/ mechanic alert... Another reason I always do my own maintenance.

Disc life varies. Generally speaking modern discs are designed to minimum weight for a few good reasons. You will likely wear out your discs before the second set of pads is fully worn out. Fitting harder pads makes this even more likely. Unless you know what you're doing you probably won't realize this.

Because discs should be machined if only to remove the no wear ridges and they are no longer thick enough to tolerate machining when worn by one set of pads, competent brake mechanics advise replacement as a more cost effective and safer solution.

Most drivers fail to realize that replacing discs with each set of pads is now the safer recommendation. You are free to endanger yourself if you wish.

So took the car to AZP yesterday and they did not found anything abnormal. They took the car for a ride and they claim its just road noise. The only thing that they found is that my front tires pressure was set to over 50psi. I did not think of checking that before, but when i got my summer tires installed those idiots must have over fill the tire pressure.

Anyway, i do think the sound is not as bad as before (although i still need to drive the car a bit more), however AZP did also mentioned that my tires are starting to get 'road dry' meaning that i should start thinking on replacing my tires at some point. But no budget for tires right now so thats gonna have to wait until next spring so i can do the wheels/tires and possibly brakes.

Very interesting, thanks so much!

Generally speaking many get through five sets of pads per disk. So worth to be more careful with stating such "truths".

Unless you plan on putting another 30k miles on this year or starting to track/autox I doubt you'll need brakes next spring.

Brake fluid would probably be a good idea though.

did the brake fluid already at 29k. We'll see hows the budget for next spring, i might want to upgrade brakes and pads.

B. S.

The surface on cast rotors shows surface rust very quickly. That rust has zero effect on the wear or life of a rotor. None. Zip.
Rotors for some cars are indeed small and light enough they should be replace with each set of pads. Ours are not those. You should easily get 3 sets of pads or more out of a set during normal driving.

Thanks for the update. So the original tech was full of shit.

Excellent argument.

Yeah, well, stock suspension and alignment is best.

Just add MCA kit in, and it's like F1 formulas.

When a shop tells you to get tires, you should probably get them. AZP would not lead you in the wrong direction. Tires are all you got when it comes to grip. Old tire = unsafe.

Here's some actual expert information about disc wear:

https://textar-professional.com/brak...-service-life/

And some older advice given to brake service technicians:

http://www.tomorrowstechnician.com/t...ce-or-replace/

Not zero, obviously. If you're getting three sets of pads on one set of rotors you should trade your BRZ for a Prius.

"For normal usage conditions, the design*life of the front wheel brake discs should be equivalent to the useful life of two sets of*corresponding brake pads. Some discs may have a shorter useful life, because they*have been designed to achieve specific targets."

NORMAL driving. That does not mean driving it as a Prius it means driving it as it should be on the public streets.

You said one I said 3 your own link puts it in the middle.

So I'm curious? In for an upgrade and I think I'm going ebc yellow stuff. Anybody tried them? Maybe also thinking of a rotor upgrade. Are the cheap slotted eBay rotors bad like Eline or power slot? Are they just as good a stock because they say oem spec in the descriptions? Anybody tried them?

Slotted/drilled rotors are not an "upgrade" stick with blank rotors for this car. Centric's are cheap on Amazon (~$40 ea) and track guys love 'em.

Yellow Stuff have mixed reviews depending on your purpose, hardcore track usage they probably won't hold up. "spirited driving in the twisties" (:suicide:) they might be fine if a little noisy and dusty. There's tons of reviews on them if you have the patience to google for them.

Thanks for the reply

As far as reliability goes blank > slotted > drilled > drilled and slotted. On track reliability matters so much more, so +1 to what strat61caster wrote, best bet would be blank disks, or not more then slotted ones. If you need more bite, better use more oriented track pads, then compromising reliability/upping chances of cracking under heavy abuse.
From not that cheap stuff there are also DBA disks. IIRC one could get even two piece ones of OE sizing.
BTW, if you think of getting most out of OEM brakes, worth considering installing airducts. Extra cooling may help with increasing heat capacity of even stockers. For example something like Velox/Touge Factory/APR kits.

:popcorn:

Of course, each driver has to make his or her own decision.

Years ago I decided turning rotors was a waste of time and money. So I fit new rotors with new pads. Car makers agree. They now fit rotors that are designed to minimum safe weight intended for one set of pads.

If you fit new pads to worn rotors you are wasting money and putting up with second rate brakes.

Up to you, of course.