Pads and discs

[Redefined]

*If I don't laugh, I'd cry. I even took the same brakes across from one to the next to continue managing the problem. Then to a third car after the problem had been cured...

[Tinonline]

22 minutes ago, Redefined said:

I do about 8000 miles in a few months of motorway. Been doing so for the past 5 years or so. Had thw dreaded brake shake on various 3L Subaru Legacies of which I had various theories thrown at me. Had em skimmed, replaced, calipers refurbed and also plenty of different discs tried.

 

To cut a long story short, my shake would usually come back after about 1k miles which I completed in a week or few. Finally hot rid of the problem with the ebc discs with dimples. Think partly i was causing them to overheat by rallying it around a bit much (sorry).

I have the shakes on the current car and it's definitely coming from the front. They're definitely not siezed calipers as they (pistons) move freely and the wheels also spin freely when jacked up. I'm probably gonna go for some EBC but the ones with dimples are expensive on for the Lexus.

 

For the record I found Bosch and that cheap German brand (I'll find the name) were both as rubbish as one another. As were the ewe or rwe (or something with 3 letters and spunds like an American drag race car)... My problem lasted about 3 years or 4 😆

OEM is no guarantee against disc warping but I’m sure OEM is the best route … possibly the complaints are due to non OEM? Lexus pads have a ceramic content so are good at dissipating heat.

Front suspension takes a lot of weight and low mileage does not stop deterioration of bushes.

When we can replace with OEM at around £200 or less per axle, given the quality and length of service it’s a no brainer. Sure do it for £120 but what are you buying? Appreciate that labour will up this if you can’t or don’t want to diy.

[Redefined]

Yes agreed @Tinonline you can't whack a bit of OEM at such low prices including the discs. I was just saying that the EBC discs is what sorted me on the previous car on which I did a bit of OEM aswell from JapCarParts 😊

[Malc1]

Thinking aloud here ...... could it be the way you drive that causes some of these issues  ?

I've never had brake problems on any of my cars over the decades ...  even decades and hundreds of thousands of miles of Ls400 driving 🤫

Malc

[BigBoomer]

If you have an issue with your brake system, it is very unlikely that it is due to the parts used.
Far more likely it is a problem specific to your car or to the way they were fitted.
I have non-OEM disks and pads all round on my LS and they work well and have had no issues since they were fitted (30k rear, 10k front).
They were all fitted by National Tyres so I have no idea what is fitted, nor do I care so long as they work and last a decent amount.

A common cause of vibrations is that people don't clean up the mating face before mounting the new disks so a bit of crud pushes the disk slightly out of flat which is undetectable at first but over time causes the disk surface to wear unevenly leading people to claim they were warped. They are not warped, they just have abnormal wear.
Another cause is contamination. Brake disks need to be thoroughly cleaned/degreased before they are fitted and you need to keep your hands clean when fitting them.

It is nearly impossible to warp a modern vented brake disk as they crack before they warp. Unvented disks can warp but very few cars use those for their front brakes these days.
Drilled disks are pretty pointless. All they do is add the possibility of cracking around the holes due to heat stress. Drilled disks were introduced to improve cooling on old unvented disks and to get rid of water that the older asbestos based brake pads were very poor at shifting.
With newer formulations of pads (both Ceramic and Sintered Metal) solid faced vented disks are far superior for all road cars, or if you regularly drive in water/mud deep enough to touch the disks use slotted face vented disks as they clear water much better than solid faced disks, at the cost of a small reduction in braking force.

On motorcycles they fit drilled unvented disks because the vented disks are heavier and affect the handling and suspension so the holes help with cooling.
However, they mostly use semi-floating disks to make them lighter still and to remove the likelihood of warping.
They are thin (typically only 6mm thick), and of course they don't have to stop anywhere near as much weight, even with me on them.
The bike + me = 500Kg but I have 2 front disks so only 250Kg per disk.
The LS + me weighs 2000+Kg and 65% of that is braked by the 2 front disks = 650Kg per disk!
On my bikes the front disks last about 40k miles before they are below the wear limit and cost £140 per front disk to replace.

[donkmeister]

I replaced the rear calipers, discs and pads on the LS460 late last year (which was fun as I was recovering from COVID... Had to take a lie down on the drive a few times!)

I was impressed with the OEM set-up. The standard rear discs had details such as being left and right-handed, with the vanes between the two surfaces curved to ensure airflow through the disc. Obviously the person who had last been in there had them back to front (confirmed by part number and the big "L" and "R" on the castings). The quality of the machining on the disc face was better than any other I've seen. 

The only downer was that bleeding through is a pain in the backside as you need to go through the rigmarole of resetting codes every time the pump realises it's losing pressure (I don't have a Toyota-specific scantool), but Lexus are far from the only manufacturer to do fancy brakes that get in a hissy without dealer tools or awkward workarounds (Mercedes, I'm looking at you). So, OP, £140 for fitting AND a fluid flush sounds like a very good deal indeed. 

Also the brake fluid spec is DOT3... Which I think is what Fred Flinstone was using in his brakes. But, fortunately DOT4 is fully compatible (I've genuinely never seen a bottle of DOT3 in 20+ years of spannering modern-ish cars)