was driving home from work this evening a car pulled out on me i was doing about 70, i had to brake quite hard the pedal felt really soft and travelled really far down. No abs kicked in as the brakes werent stopping that severe to get it to kick in. These discs and pads are only 250 miles old and i do drive quite sedate as a rule so they havent been put through any real hard braking. Ive just been out again and done 60mph bringing it to 10mph quite hard a few times and its still the same are my brakes not bedded in yet or are these mintex pads crap or do i have another problem??
serious braking problem
- Thread starter tedster
- Start date
Have you changed the brake fluid lately? You could have air in the brake lines or if your fluid is old it could contain high levels of water because brake fluid is hydroscopic. Both air and water compress much easier than pure brake fluid which means that a lot of your braking effort simply compresses the water/air in the lines rather than force the brake pads against the discs. This causes a "long" brake pedal as you've described. High H2O levels in your fluid also reduce the boiling point so you boil your brakes much easier and get brake fade. It could just be that the pads/discs haven't bedded in yet though but it's worth considering.
tedster, did you fit them yourself?
tedster - given that this seems to be the first time that you have used them in anger the problem may have been there since the pads were fitted or even before and has either been created by the pad change or just continued to deteriorate.
Since they were fitted by a garage I'd take it back and get them to sort it out. They can put it on a brake tester as used for MOT and see if all is well. They could have done something stupid, fluids could need changing as Curtis suggested, but not something to mess about waiting to solve.
Since they were fitted by a garage I'd take it back and get them to sort it out. They can put it on a brake tester as used for MOT and see if all is well. They could have done something stupid, fluids could need changing as Curtis suggested, but not something to mess about waiting to solve.
Unless you track your car or are are unusually hard on your brakes, I can not image that the fluid has deteriorated in 35k miles. There is the possibility of contamination, but again this is rare. IMHO, the most likely culprit is air in the lines due to some faulty workmanship when the pads were changed.
Well ive resolved the brake issue its called spending proper money on a full set of ebc green stuff pads and grooved and spotted discs. Took my car to my independent specialist to which he concluded that the discs seem to be of a poor standard and in less than 400 miles they have worn the front pads down over half way, he thinks the discs have some serious error in them or ive got a set of poorly manufactured pads. Either way im not pissing about any more with my brakes it just aint worth it major lesson learned here DONT BUY CHEAP!!!
Eeeeekkkk - at least you're going to get it sorted now. Think that's put me off non-branded brakes forever.
Shipkiller
Veteran
Brake fluid should be changed every TWO years.
It is hydroscopic (absorbs water), and over time, if you get your brakes hot the boiling point will be a lot lower than when the fluid was new. When your brake fluid boils, it puts air in the lines. The air will not be absorbed back into the fluid. The only way is to bleed them....
One question: Why did you put 'drilled/slotted' rotors on? Is your car a M///?
It is hydroscopic (absorbs water), and over time, if you get your brakes hot the boiling point will be a lot lower than when the fluid was new. When your brake fluid boils, it puts air in the lines. The air will not be absorbed back into the fluid. The only way is to bleed them....
One question: Why did you put 'drilled/slotted' rotors on? Is your car a M///?
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tedster said:
I forgot that you had changed the rotors. IIRC at the time I posted a caution when you went for Ebay rotors. Glad you found it and sorted it before you really needed to use them in anger...
