I have Prius 2006, about 62000 miles. A week ago I was at my Toyota dealer for annual inspection. My car passed inspection, but service advisor wrote in my bill that my car needs front brake rotor and pads due to rust. The price he put $485.50 for this job. I'm not sure that my car needs all that because my brakes are good and I don't hear any noise. My questions are: 1. how to verify that my car needs a front brake rotor? 2. Isn't it too pricy for just front brakes? Are any advises?
The only problem with your brakes is they aren't being used enough. You're obviously driving your car gently!!! And as always brake jobs are way overpriced compared to how easy it is to DIY... Solution: Go find some steep hills and do some hard braking under 6mph and get all that rust off! Then have a second look to see if the rust is all gone!
I have just about 92,000 on my '06 and have the original pads and rotors. Toyota service told me the same thing and quoted about the same price ballpark. I still have about 3mm left on my pads and since the pads operate at sppeds less than 7mph, I'm waiting until I get to the recommended minimum thickness of 2mm before replacing the pasds and rotors. You can get rid of alot of rust if you are traveling on the road with no cars behind you, shift into "N" and hit the brakes hard. If you do that a few times, you will remove alot of rust but be aware of cars behind you and be safe.
Another way to do this is to put the car in neutral while braking. Neutral disengages the HV battery and thus the regen braking. I usually do this while slowing for a traffic light with no one in front of me. It only takes a couple of times of doing this from about 45 mph to get the rotors nice and clean.
