Grinding Brakes
12-07-2012, 03:20 PM
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Grinding Brakes So bought my 99 Formula in August, as far as I'm aware the brake pads were brand new at the time. never had any noise and plenty of stopping power.
About a week ago on my way to work there was an accident in front of me, I slammed on the brakes to avoid it and luckily got around it fine and got to work after making sure everyone was ok, drove to work fine with no noise from the brakes. Then when I left work that night the front brakes started squealing whenever I applied any pressure to the brake pedal and the rear brakes started grinding as well.
Now I'm know the brakes have an auto adjusting system for setting themselves, (according to the manual) so I'm wondering if they readjusted themselves too tightly or if I'm looking at having screwed up the rotors/pads. It has been rather cold here lately so I was thinking the rotors may have heated up and then cooled too fast and warped but just wanted to get some ideas on what everyone thought.
About a week ago on my way to work there was an accident in front of me, I slammed on the brakes to avoid it and luckily got around it fine and got to work after making sure everyone was ok, drove to work fine with no noise from the brakes. Then when I left work that night the front brakes started squealing whenever I applied any pressure to the brake pedal and the rear brakes started grinding as well.
Now I'm know the brakes have an auto adjusting system for setting themselves, (according to the manual) so I'm wondering if they readjusted themselves too tightly or if I'm looking at having screwed up the rotors/pads. It has been rather cold here lately so I was thinking the rotors may have heated up and then cooled too fast and warped but just wanted to get some ideas on what everyone thought.
12-07-2012, 06:18 PM
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Not a matter of knowing what I'm doing, I've changed brakes before, just never seen a set act like that to go from practically brand new and no noise to grinding like their down to bare metal for a month. I havent had a chance to tear it down yet, damn job and all, to see it, just wondering if anyone else had had this happen under these circumstances and what they found when they tore it down so I can go ahead and buy what parts are necessary and have everything ready to go when i do work on it this weekend.
12-08-2012, 12:07 PM
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Disc brakes have no self adjusting, as the pads wear more the calipers fill with more brake fluid filling the brake caliper cylinders. Drum brakes have a mechanical self adjuster.
12-08-2012, 07:42 PM
#7
You should stop driving it until the problem is corrected.
My theory here is that whoever did them didn't know what they were doing.
No worries here. This is what brakes are supposed to do.
This is not good. The brakes may not have been put back together correctly, with the proper torque applied, or the hardware dressed appropriately. They should be thoroughly checked out. (The pins and hardware re-lubed at a minimum. They might even need to be replaced.)
"Self-adjusters" are typically items on an old-style drum brake, which are not on these cars. The disk brakes will "adjust" as the pads wear down normally, but one panic stop wouldn't wear that pads enough to make a noticeable difference.
The squeaking may not be a big problem but grinding in the rear is worrisome.
My theory here is that whoever did them didn't know what they were doing.
The squeaking may not be a big problem but grinding in the rear is worrisome.
