How long do your rear brake pads last ?

[Mark w]

Changed mine at the weekend ( along with the discs , what a right PITA 🙆🏻 that was , why cannot they design it so that the discs are retained with proper bolts , ended up having to drill a couple out as they are made of cheese ) and was alarmed to find one pad was right down to the metal and the other 3 were not that far off .

 

It doesn't seem that long since I last changed the pads . I have AP 4 pots on the front and still have the original discs and am only half way through the second set of pads yet have had twice that many sets of pads on the rears and yet they hardly seem to polish the rust off the disc so its hardly over braked at the rear .

 

Noticed the last rear pads were lucas and these are Delco so maybe better luck this time ?

 

[Z3MCJez]

This question is a bit of "How long is a piece of string".

 

In my Academy spec car, I used standard rear brake pads and needed 2 sets to get through the year (which is a shorter year). In my current Supersport Spec car, I have used one set for a full year. They cost 5x the price and last about 2x as long.

 

Jez

[Iain A]

I also have 4 pots on the front and standard on the rear.. The rear ones need changing a lot more often than the fronts... maybe 5 times as often...

I do run the more grippy ones at the back though. (Scorpio rather than Sierra spec??)

 

[Stationary M25 Traveller]

When checking the rears ....... look at the inside pad too .... as they wear faster than the outside pad.

[Birkin S3 ZA.]

Front Wilwoods 4 pot 18 months rear Std golf 4 with Ferodo DS2500 about the same 18 months to 2 years.

 

Edited by - Birkin S3 ZA. on 25 Sep 2013 18:36:28

[Mark w]

Quoting Iain A: 

I also have 4 pots on the front and standard on the rear.. The rear ones need changing a lot more often than the fronts... maybe 5 times as often...

I do run the more grippy ones at the back though. (Scorpio rather than Sierra spec??)

 

Ok , this seems to support what I have found .

 

Do you know the spec for the Scorpio ones . The ones I have just put in are delco ref 507 , not sure what they are off , CC supplied them as " uprated " to be used in conjunction with the 4pot fronts .

 

What I cannot get my head round is why the pads wear so quickly but the discs don't , I had to change my discs because the surface was suffering with surface rust as a result of the pads not polishing it ! It was if the discs haddnt been used but the pads had worn out !

 

[subirg]

My rears need replacing much more frequently than the fronts. I used a heat gun to measure temps and the rears were massively higher than the fronts. This doesn't help pad life.

 

However... This year I made a massive rear pad breakthrough and wear rates are much reduced. The source of this miracle???? My right foot. I finally twigged that under hard braking, I was catching the accelerator. Rear brakes didn't like that. Now that I have adapted my brake application technique, my braking distances are shorter, rear temps are lower and the pads are lasting miles longer. Simples!

[Stationary M25 Traveller]

If you don't brake hard (when safe to do so) when you first set off ... to clean the surface corrosion off the rear discs, the rough surface will eat the friction material. Especially so if car put away wet, or when salt on the roads.

 

Gentle braking doesn't do this, as the rears don't do a lot of the work when pedal pushed gently..

 

This also applies to tin tops.

[FramerateUK]

I had a squeak (not a loud one...) from the rear after a trackday earlier this year, I took the wheels off and pads off to find .

 

They were replaced, but after a couple of trackdays and the Scotland trip, I noticed a little squeak on my way back from Pembrey last weekend. I'll need to get the pads out to check them again. The fronts look fine though!

 

Edited by - FramerateUK on 25 Sep 2013 14:16:50

[Steve Wright]

I've got 53,000 miles on mine, original pads front and rear, and still going strong. (Maybe I don't slow down enough )

 

Mine is a road car but even on a track or race car, shouldn't the fronts wear at a faster rate than the rears?

 

Could the handbrake cable be adjusted a bit tight so that they are constantly under pressure against the discs? Just a thought.

[Paul McKenzie]

Quoting FramerateUK: 

I had a squeak (not a loud one...) from the rear after a trackday earlier this year, I took the wheels off and pads off to find .

 

They were replaced, but after a couple of trackdays and the Scotland trip, I noticed a little squeak on my way back from Pembrey last weekend. I'll need to get the pads out to check them again. The fronts look fine though!

 

Edited by - FramerateUK on 25 Sep 2013 14:16:50

 

They're a bit awkward to check - I normally find that the sqeak gives the game away .

 

Also the reason for the very uneven wear, is that the rigid brake lines in the CC installation don't allow the caliper to 'float'. This can be improved to a certain degree with flexi rear brake lines.

[Mark w]

Quoting Steve Wright: 

I've got 53,000 miles on mine, original pads front and rear, and still going strong. (Maybe I don't slow down enough )

 

Mine is a road car but even on a track or race car, shouldn't the fronts wear at a faster rate than the rears?

 

Could the handbrake cable be adjusted a bit tight so that they are constantly under pressure against the discs? Just a thought.

 

Steve

You need to get a life 😬

53,000 miles on one set of pads , are you pushing it around !!!! ?

My pads only seem to last around 5000 max ,

 

 

anyway what my original post seems to confirm is that rears wear out faster than fronts for some reason and some people don't use their brakes .

 

[Nigel Riches]

My wife found a way to save brake pad wear, ram the car into the one in front *mad*took months to fix rather than an hour in the garage at the weekend 🙆🏻

 

Nigel

[FramerateUK]

Just to add, I finally checked my pads on the weekend after fitting new ones in the spring. The rears still look brand new, no sign of wear at all, while the fronts are clearly thinner than they were, but still lots of life left on them.

 

Safe to say, that aside from the very worn (And broken!) pads my car came with, the fronts are most definitely wearing quicker than the rear.

[charlie_pank]

I strongly suspect that most of the problem here is down to the rigid brake lines and badly adjusted handbrake cables. I have never had to replace the rear brake pads because of wear, I've owned the car for over 10 years and I always drive it like I stole it.

[Mark w]

Quoting charlie_pank: 

I strongly suspect that most of the problem here is down to the rigid brake lines and badly adjusted handbrake cables. I have never had to replace the rear brake pads because of wear, I've owned the car for over 10 years and I always drive it like I stole it.

 

So what is the correct adjustment for the handbrake ? Provided it's not binding I don't see how that effects it ?

[charlie_pank]

Well, Maine's adjusted so that when it's off it allows the wheels to turn freely. Perhaps the difference is that mine is only ever used at MOT time as I have harnesses and it's under the scuttle on the passenger side. As I have no reverse I'd notice when I put the car away if there was any extra resistance from a dragging brake!

[sjmmarsh]

Rear pads can start to wear rapidly if you don't brake hard enough. The rear discs start to corrode through lack of use and so are more abrasive. The fronts (and the airbrake screen) do most of the work.

 

Simple fix - jam the anchors on hard occasionally!

 

Steve

 

[Stationary M25 Traveller]

Quoting SM25T: 

If you don't brake hard (when safe to do so) when you first set off ... to clean the surface corrosion off the rear discs, the rough surface will eat the friction material. Especially so if car put away wet, or when salt on the roads.

 

Gentle braking doesn't do this, as the rears don't do a lot of the work when pedal pushed gently..

 

This also applies to tin tops.

There's an echo in here !!

 

Hi Steve

 

Edited by - SM25T on 2 Oct 2013 08:14:52

[sjmmarsh]

It is still good advice though SM25T! Particularly for the 7 where you often don't really need to brake at all if you are anticipating the road well.

 

It also saves money in not needing to replace the rear discs prematurely due to corrosion.

 

Many tintops don't have this problem now if they have stability control as it regularly applies the brakes to stabilise the car in corners - unless you are driving well and used to a 7, so the system seldom cuts in..... If you have high pad and disc wear on a tintop this may be why.

 

Steve

 

 

[Fishy Dave]

I'm sure that heat, lack of airflow and whether your car has a bias valve to the rears plays a part in their higher wear rates on cars which see track miles. The standard pads on mine crumbled and in fact pieces came off after a few track days. The uprated blue spot pads and currently Mintex1144s seems to cope much better, but I do play around with the balance to make sure the rears do their share of braking.

[Drumster]

Just checked my service records and found that they were first changed on 41K (and they really needed changing) and then again at 70K. Maybe with a x/flow and then a Zetec the heavy engine is making the fronts work harder and the backs less???