I know, eh? You might need a clamp to compress the brake piston, but easy-peasy.
Brake rotor rip-offs occur because 99.99% of car owners are not in a position (skill and/or tools) to determine whether there is enough material remaining on the rotor to make re-surfacing feasible.
Couple of years ago an employee came to me asking me about an $800.00 quote from her dealer to replace pads and rotors. Advised it was a bit high. I then aked her about symptoms to which she replied “steering wheel shake when braking from freeway speed.” Being suspicious of the diagnosis, to say nothing of the price quote, I recommended a friend’s shop for a second opinion. $60.00 later the shake was gone. As noted earlier, and unless you are equipped to make your own evaluation, you just need a good mechanic you can trust. Lots of good ones out there, not so many you can trust.
I replaced the pads on my last van two weeks before trading it in. The rotors needed replacing. My mechanic warned me it would shorten the life of the new pads. But they’d still be fine for a few thousand miles. More than enough for a van getting traded in. The brakes worked great with new pads.
FYI, brake rotor warpage increased dramatically when the federal government prohibited asbestos from being used in brake pads. Asbestos was relatively efficient w/regard to the dissipation of heat. Heat not dissipated ends up in the rotor. Another source of warpage is indiscriminate use pneumatic impact wrenches which frequently over-torque lug nuts. A good shop will only use a torque wrench to tighten lugs.
Try going to an indipendent mechanic for your brakes. I have never met one yet that didn’t measure the rotor and if it was in spec, to turn them. My local NAPA will still turn rotors for you if you are doing the job yourself. The reason the dealers don’t want to turn rotors are: it is easier to replace than turn, bigger profit in new parts than rehabing old ones and sadly, most OEM rotors are paper thin, making turning impossible more than once if even that.
One reason it’s hard to accept is because CAR MANUFACTURERS specifically instruct to NOT resurface rotors unless they’re warped or have significant scoring, e.g. greater than 0.060". Another is that an uncut used rotor surface works better than a new or resurfaced one, until the fresh surface has been embedded with some pad material.
Decades ago we routinely resurfaced or replaced rotors to get the desired surface finish for the purpose of minimizing noise. With modern noise-reduction pads, this is usually no longer an issue.
Grinding sound usually means a pad has worn totally and its metal backing is digging into the rotor. A certain amount of resultant rotor wear is acceptable for reuse as-is; beyond that amount typically means there’s not enough metal to resurface and reuse and thus new rotors are called for. Where to draw the line between safe and unsafe can come down to a matter of professional opinion, and will vary with one’s personal experience, regard for manufacturer’s specs, and “worry factor” about safety-related issues.
If you trust him, then just tell him what your goal is. With new pads, noise isn’t likely, it’s braking power and longevity that are the concerns. But this fellow will have a HUGE advantage over us here in actually seeing the rotors.
This I find worrisome. It may be part of normal wear patterns, or it may be something more sinister – and serious – like a pad falling out place. Best bet: have it checked yesterday.
To clarify post #26, factory instructions are to reuse rotors as-is, without resurfacing, unless they have certain specified problems.
Often the outer edge of a rotor has a ridge outside where the pads rubbed. It needs to go. I simply grind it off.
While you should definitely have things inspected by someone who knows what they’re doing (shop or amateur), this can occasionally be innocuous. Rust can build up on the surfaces of the rotors. Most often, this is from something like washing the car and spraying water on the rotors, then letting the car sit where it is, provding no chance to disperse the water. It can also happen from road salt being splashed onto a parked car.
In some cases, this can be so extreme that the car will act like it is “stuck to the floor” and will refuse to move until the brakes are freed up.
I hadn’t thought of what what Terry Kennedy mentioned – surface rust (usually invisible) can cause pads to stick to the rotor, and can cause (harmless) noise that sounds for all the world like metal grinding away vigorously. Usually it will get cleaned off of the rotors in a few stops. How much has the car been driven since the noise came on?
I would say the brakes have been used moderately in the time since this has occured. All four rotors have rust on their surface. Hopefully this is all it is. It is going in on Monday, mainly to get the check engine light turned off (I have a mandatory emissions inspection coming up).
It love this car, it has been very good to me. I just hate to spend much money on it when it has so very many miles.
Take off the wheel and simply measure the rotor, look up the acceptable wear limit.
If it squeals as well as grinds then its the pad wear indicator…do not ignore that.
Videos of how to change the pads is easy to find on youtube, as a car fix job its pretty simple for most cars, and cheap to boot, a simple cheapo c clamp is enough to push the piston back in so yu can reinstall the thing. i did mine after watching a few youtube videos and reading the chiltons/haynes manual. but first things first, take the wheel off and look at the rotor.
rotor wear depends on the type of pad, the harder ceramics and such will go through your rotor faster. factory pads and cheaper pads won’t.
there shouldn’t be rust on the rotor surface, any should be worn away just from brake use.
Step one is “acquire a micrometer.”
yeah, that’s true; if there’s rust on the braking surfaces even after driving, then the caliper is likely stuck on its slide.
micrometers on ebay are next to nothing in cost;)
If discard is 1.0 inches, a good scale will tell what you need. Whether it is 1.002’’ or 0.998 makes little difference.