Brake failure @ 57k???

In a Gen 3 (and presumably Gen 4) that should be ok. Gen 1 and Gen 2 require regular use of the parking brake for the rear brake adjusters to function.

-Chap

 

What was the final bill? $400 for everything in the back is cheap for rotors, all pads, rebuild calipers or replace, flush. Oh yeah, the flush argh!

 

I'm an inlander these days, but Goofy spends quite a bit of time in a salt air environment, and we have several other G3s in our local turf (fleet vehicles.) Also G3's are rather popular in coastal California.
I'm thinking therefore that corrosive failure for the rear brake calipers doesn't represent a failure for Toyota's Q/A but rather a misunderstanding of basic car maintenance...either at the dealership or in the driveway.

I've said it myself.
Priuses are pretty much just filters and fluids out to about 125,000 miles.....HOWEVER (comma!) one does have to also do things like rotate tires, change wipers, check signaling lamps, perform hull bottom inspections and...............(wait for it!)................check the brakes every now and again before the 125,000 mile mark.
All of this is spelled out in the maintenance schedule, which to be upfront and honest with everybody here...I'm not all that familiar with for the Prius.
I don't have to be, since my car is a fleet vehicle.

(Note to self: NEVER buy an off-lease or previous rental vehicle!)

Since many car owners have a closed-hood maintenance philosophy, they either need to identify and use hired muscle to perform these checks----or hope that when a failure occurs that it's not more catastrophic than a $400 brake repair.

I can afford to pay to have my maintenance checks done----even at my humble salary but what I cannot afford is to have some entry-level wrench NOT perform a thorough check when I take the car in for service, so I have to take ownership of the ownership task.
Part of it comes from my motorcycle/bicycle background (to say nothing of my submarine experience,)
Part of it comes from the fact that cars are pretty darned expensive these days.

Priuses DO have a weak link, but it's not the brakes and it's not all of the 'sudden oil usage' threads in this forum, and it's not even the crooked dealers that will spend five minutes trying to sell you a throttle body service package while they're not wiggling brake calipers.

 

That is horrible....so sorry about your brakes...my Prius c has 27,500 on it now and I didn't know I had to watch the brakes so carefully....my Toyota dealer reported to Toyota.com that my Prius c had 33,400 miles on it when I bought it....it had 26,400 miles but the dealer refused to correct its mistake and I had to fight to receive my pink slip with the correct mileage on it....it took two months for my pink slip and registration to arrive....my insurance company was waiting for title to be transferred to me so I have not had an insurance card or registration in my car.....very frustrating but I love the car

 

That's not a bad deal on brakes, and it took a while for this to happen. Periodic checks were likely neglected, caliper pin lube mighta helped. Maybe just change your perception, instead of thinking "brake failure at 57K", think "brake work needed...".

I still suspect misalignment of the pad pin on the caliper piston's cross pattern. If you could see the old pads, look at the backing plate of the pad in contact with the caliper piston: there's a stubby pin, does it look relatively pristine, or is the top face chewed up and bevelled?

 

Yes, because it's located for easy viewing by the passenger, not by the driver. Clever, huh?

 

While it's never pleasant to have an unexpected repair -- a 4 year old car with 60k can have many things go wrong. The brake components are living in very harsh environment. Calipers with pins all have the possibility to stick.

We have two Prius in the fleet -- they are the only cars that have not needed brake work at 60k. The cars are so reliable -- I think they get neglected.

Mine get inspected even 10k with the rotation/ oil change.

 

Boy cars are more reliable than they use to be.