Prius Brake Creaking Noise - Almost Solved

Hi all! I've been a long time reader and first time poster. And without Priuschat I'd be pretty much nowhere when it comes to maintenance.

Long story short, my '07 Prius' brakes have begun creaking. It's got 172, 000 miles. I found various videos explaining why this happens

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this is the most common video:

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and I naturally chose the most common reason why this may happen:

- Dry/corrosion on caliper guiding pins causing it to seize

So I decided to take a chance and open up the brakes and grease up everything I can lube up with Sil-Glyde (guide pins, back of pads, ears of pads, brake clips (under clips and on clips)).

Also checked the pads. Inner pad wear was greater than outer pad wear. Inner pad was at 3-4mm and outer pad was 5-6mm. Didn't measure correctly because... Just because. Point is the inner pad is close to activating the squealing wear indicator in a few.

{{Note: Pins were NOT dry or seized; still had good movement and some grease from the beginning.}}

The only place I didn't grease up was the caliper piston which I sort of clean because there was some built-up debris.

So I put it all back and it creaks everything I depress the brakes while the car is in park and the creaking gets worse or better as I depress/press the brake.

Why is it still creaking? Could it be a problem with the caliper piston? I'll try to get a video of it soon.

Thanks in advance!

 

Sorry for the late reply. Work tends to get in the way of things.

So I haven't got a chance to take the brakes apart again, because I would like to replace both the pads and rotors. And so I'm waiting for them to arrive (you have to wait for Akebono - that's a fact)

Still, I've started to do more research and ask people I know who understand brakes. We went over everything I greased up and came to the conclusion that the one place I didn't grease was between the two shims. And that might be it.

I still haven't recorded a video of the noise, but I'm leaning towards those shims. The new pads I ordered have only one shim on each pad and this is new (so new tech). The original pads were designed in 2004 and that's probably what they though would be best then to reduce vibration noise.

The thing they didn't take into consideration was that these shims would contract and expand due to heat and voila you have two loose plates squeezing together metal to metal.

I also doubt it would be the caliper piston since both sides of the car have this noise and I'm sure the RF brakes are also wearing out in a similar manner.

What are you thoughts?

ChampmanF - I will try after I replace both pads and rotors with the new fitting kits supplied by Akebono. If the noise persists, I will do a video testing all of the parts, especially the piston.