Anyone replaced brake pads due to wear?

I've seen all of the speculation about brakes lasting 100-200k and was wondering if anyone on the forum has had their brake pads (or for the techs) replaced them due to wear...

I'm at 77k and during the past 500 or so miles I have noticed some minor squealing coming from the brakes. For better or worse I have never made it to the point where I have heard the "warning squeals" coming from brake pads (with my previous Hondas I always had rotor wobble prior to noise) and am unfamiliar with how they sound.

It isn't constant yet seems to occur when rolling to a slow stop (parking, stop sign, etc). No noise, for example, when driving 40MPH and coming to a quicker stop at a traffic light.

I know I need to have them looked at during the next rotation, but just wondering about experience out there...

92,000 miles and the original brakes look as good as new! (and if you read my other posts, I regularly tow trailers to and from LA and Las Vegas with two motorcycles, as well as some 118 mph top end runs!)

Be sure to check yours before going someplace and telling them that you hear "squealing", because before the end of the day you will definetly be hearing some squealing, and not from the brakes!

hmm... i don't think DH has changed a set of prius brake pads yet. i know i would have heard about it if he did. he once called me in the middle of an experiment (thanks dear :blink to tell me that he had a prius with over 100k and still significant brake pad life left.

I have a squealing front break and the garage has just looked at it and said it is the wear indicator and that the pads are 90% worn. The car has done 50,000 miles, mostly on back roads but generally slow and steady.
The squeal is very high pitched and occurs under 30mph when the brakes are not in use. The breaks were looked at last summer with the same squeal and the discs were replaced and the pads resurfaced. That didn't do the job and it was a month later when they greased the back of pad it stopped squealing. I think the pad just keeps coming away from the piston but has anyone else got any ideas.

The brake pads on a Prius are pulled back when not in use, so you should get no indication from the wear indicator unless you are using the brakes. It sounds to me like yours are sticking.

Tom

Or perhaps there is some dirt/grime in there somewhere.

... Brad

Thanks Brad and Tom, and sorry to all for my hasty spelling - or lack of checking. Does anyone know if the pads rely on a sticky layer of high melting point grease on the backs to pull them away from the disc or is there some other mechanism?

just curious, is this the front or rear? i have a personal bet that the rears wear down first

In my case it is the front, and the squeal is from the front off side, but I think my brake wear is not usual.

i have noticed that when taking my car for the "free" 21 point vehicle inspection, i cannot obtain a straight answer on how much brake pad i have left, sometimes it is 9mm, and sometimes it is 5mm and the 9s are 5s and the 5s suddenly become 9s, its like suddenly after 5000 miles, my car's brake pads grew 4mm

I've been wondering if rotor warping will be a thing of the past with the regenerative braking. I've read various explanations of rotor warping over the years and while I've noticed that overtightened/unevenly tightened lug nuts have coincided with warping I've also read some good explanations that the problem is results from hard braking, emergency stops, or long downhill braking followed by then sitting parked with the brakes held down (for lights, etc.) The reasoning is that holding the pads in place results in some varnish effect and/or uneven cooling of the rotors. A suggestion I've read to avoid this (other than not doing hard stops) is to allow a very slow roll when you have had to brake hard from highway speed and are waiting to go again.

i heard rumors that the prius hardly uses it brakes at all, that the parts rust for non use.

ive been wondering if regenerative braking causes more wear on the tires,this i my first prius and i have already replaced the tires at 34,000 miles, and they were all uniformly worn down to 4mm so i replaced them

Hmm - you can inspect the outside front brake pads yourself by looking through the wheel to see how thick the pad is. Do not count the steel backing plate on the pad. If you get excited and motivated by this process, you can expand the project to inspecting all four wheels by removing the tires. This allows you to see the inside front brake pads. You can remove the rear brake drums to see the rear brake shoes, when the parking brake is released.

Regarding regen braking causing more tire wear, this is a reasonable theory since this puts all of the braking load on the front tires.

If you got 34K miles out of the Goodyear Integrity tires, you are doing much better than most owners. I changed those tires at 15K miles.

I doubt that regen itself causes more wear on the tires because it is gentler braking in many regards. However, when you do slow down there are going to be fewer losses to engine braking and aero drag so more of the load will shift to regen/brakes. (I hope that makes sense.) The tires would be impacted most by the difference in aero losses since whether braking comes from regen, the friction pads, or from the engine braking the tires have to carry the load. But with aero losses the load is being transferred to the air through the surface of the vehicle so that fraction doesn't go back into the tires. That's my back of the envelope analysis, but some of the hypermiler gurus probably have better insight on this.

OEM tires lasting 34,000 sound pretty good to me. On my other vehicles I don't think I've ever had a set of OEM tires last much past 20,000. Typically I get half as much life out of an OEM as whatever better handling tire I use to replace them.

i replaced mine around 185,000 km it had 4 mm left (40%) and this car used to be a taxi! Mechanics/Technicians hate hybrids in general because it robs their brake jobs as it can pay more than an hour and a half and is very easy job once the person has mastered the skill. When I measured the rotor thickness, I only lost like .5 of MM of depth, so I was still almost in the region when the rotor was first manufactured. (There goes needing to machine your rotors)

I guess that's why I'm leaning towards a service advisory job in the mean time when the trade stabilizes, but doesn't hurt to practice on your own car in the mean time.

At the dealership i work at, there was a bulletin on the board saying that customers were complaining about situations rigormortis was talking about. On flat rate some techs save time and tries to eyeball the pad life, sometimes only seeing one side of the pad (what about the other side!). My boss was pissed about this, and saw if he caught anyone who doesn't use a brake measuring tool can kiss their position goodbye, because there are many willing to take the spot.

nah these were bridgestone turanzas, they had a treadlife warranty but it was void because they came with the car. i think i should of had 15,000 or so miles left on it, not sure

i replaced them with michelin pilot primacy tires, thought about changing my mind, because they do not have a treadlife warranty, but kept them anyway, they were a special order. sounded like they would be quieter too

My 2004 Prius had a brake inspection at 120k miles. The rear shoes were 50% used and the fronts still had 90% left. The front rotors are smooth as glass. I'll look at them again at 150k .

JeffD

I just took a pic while changing back to my Kyowas. My Prius has 77k miles on it. It does not look like I will need to change the pads any time soon.

The outside pad looks great. How about the inside pad - did you see whether that has a similar amount of lining left?

I'm impressed that your photo doesn't show much rust - this looks more like a car driven in California, instead of one subject to nasty East Coast winter weather and salt on the roads...

Nope, I assumed the inisde pad would be the same. I thought of checking but I was tired from swapping 3 rims. I would then have to turn the wheel back in order to pop the last rim in. So I said forget it :0

I am surprise at the rust too. I went through 06 and 07 NY winter and the car was parked outdoor too. I now have a garage and being parking indoor for the past 3 months.