"Brake Service" every 2 years/32,000km.

It may not be a good idea to loosen the lug nuts until the wheel is off of the ground, or if you do make sure you only turn them 1/8 of a turn or so. They should be re-torqued before the car is lowered.

This car uses lug centric wheels (vs hub centric) and the nuts are what keeps the wheel centered.

 

Brake service seems to be fairly important - well that is my conclusion today.

I have just been to the shop - my right rear brakes were doing a lot of noise. They took the wheel off, noticed one of the pads (the outer one) was worn out very unevenly (one side of the pad was fine, the other nearly completely worn out), reaching the alarm that rings when pads need to be replaced - the cause of the noise I was hearing. Their hypothesis: pads were "stuck", not enough lubricant / sand / salt / corrosion, so it stayed in position close to the disk, and worn out prematurely, on one side only. The 3 other rear pads are fine.

Yet, I did all the recommended maintenance, including the brake service at 32 000 km. My Prius just reached 50 000 km.

Anyone else got that problem?

They said I need a new set of brakes: new pads, new disks, on both rear wheels. 500 $. :-(

My questions:
1- Is it necessary to replace the disks as well? (I know many people keep the same disks, just replace the pads)
2- Is it necessary to replace the brakes on both wheels? (they say yes, otherwise it will brake unevenly)
3- Does the story about pads being "stuck" makes sense? (the car is not very old, and recommended maintenance was done)

Snow is common here, along with sand and salt on roads. Consequently, brakes can "stick" more quickly - I guess. Prius brakes are used less (because of regen braking, which I use a lot), so that may make the problem worse. I am thinking I may have to do the brake service more often than recommended, to avoid that in the future.

Thoughts?

 

+1
There is also no reason to check disk runout if the driver is competent enough to notice a pulsing pedal.

 

Really ? I did not know you need to change the engine at 32k miles on Camry
-Alex

 

wow, that's pretty unusual. considering that it must have happened between the 32,000 km brake check and now, did you notice poor mileage during that period?

 

I hope he caught you before you changed your engine.

 

1. This is a tough call without knowing the condition of the discs. Have the shop show you what is out of spec about the discs. You will still be at their mercy but if you ask questions they might tell the truth. Can't hurt.

2. You should keep the brakes on both sides of the car symmetrical. You might get away with doing one side, but you also might not. If you only do one side, you will be doing brake work again sooner because the side you didn't replace will need work sooner than if you replaced it.

3. Sometimes bad things happen. It shouldn't of happened but it's believable.

Once you get your brakes fixed, make it a habit to make at least one good stop a day where you are actually using the friction brakes. It doesn't have to be a panic stop but you should be pressing on the brake pedal well past the point where the MFD shows max regen. If you brakes still have rust on them when you get home after making real stop, you aren't using your brakes enough.

 

One trick I heard was to occasionally shift to Neutral and then apply the brakes. This will disengage regen braking and make the stop completely via brake pads.

 

That sounds good, it removes the need to estimate how hard you need to press the pedal to actuate the friction brakes.

 

I drive about 35,000 miles a year. When I rotate my tires I look at the discs and pads for wear. I am 90,000 miles on my 2010 Prius and they are showing very little wear. I would not pay for this made up scumbag dealer charge.

On my last 2000 Toyota 4Runner I did not need new front brakes until I hit 170,000 miles. The rear never replaced and I sold the car with 305,000 miles.

 

Cleaning the pad retainer clips and lubricating the slide pins on an annual basis is a good practice in regions where rust build-up is an issue. Honda has at one point, recommended the application of M77 under the pad retaining clips to prevent corrosion build-up, which normally causes pads to get stuck and result in premature wear.

I can already foresee many rear disc issues on these cars in the coming years. The friction brakes see very little use to begin with, let alone the rears. Toyota really should have stuck to rear drums for this app. On highway commuters, this is likely to be an especially big issue since those cars really do not see much brake usage at all. I am at 38k on my 2011, and am starting to get rust/corrosion buildup on the rear rotors that causes noise for the first few stops.

 

Yes, especially recently - no matter what I did when driving to the office, I could not get fuel economy as good as last summer.

What worries me most is what should I do to prevent this from happening in the future. Even doubling the frequency of brake service would not have done it. Brake service is recommended every 32,000 km. Doubling frequency would mean every 16,000 km instead, which means I would have done one at 48,000 km, which was reached 2 weeks ago. That much wear could not have happened in 2 weeks, could it. I guess the problem started before that.

I am starting to consider learning to clean my brakes myself, and do it twice a year, when I change the tires (which would be approximately every 10,000 km).

 

probably a good idea to clean and lubricate often. but perhaps it was just a fluke, i'd definately keep my eye on them. we have a ton of snow and salt around here and i've never seen anything like that in 135,000 miles of driving in 3 pri.

 

I am at 90,000 miles now. This is a pic of my brakes at 60K.



Those pads look brand new but there is rust. This is how you fix that.


Scrape off the rust and paint with High Temp paint. Then it will look like this.



I have 90K now. I predict the brakes will last over 300K miles with out maintenance.

 

I'd like to be a fly-on-the-wall sometime when you're across the counter from a hapless service writer, lol.

Brakes can go bad though, for various reasons. With the hybrid Prius it seems like they're going to last a long time, due to next to no workout, but I wouldn't totally discount periodic inspection.

 

It is rare for me to go to the dealer. At around 40,000 I had them flush the trans fluid. I would rather have a Toyota dealer do that kind of work and the price was right.

The service writer started selling me all the BS that I have to have done. I was nice and repeated myself twice. I am only here to have the trans fluid flush. They got the message.

Don’t get me wrong. You should inspect your brakes at least every 6 months. Take a flash light and shine it on the disc. If it is showing groves you have an issue. Shine a flash light on both sides of the brake pads. If it is thin or close to the metal it needs replaced. If one side is thinner than the other there is an issue.

Paying a scumbag dealer to do the same is not worth $118.

 

I once brought an Accord in for a cracked brake disk. The car had sounded just weird every time the brakes were applied. I took off the wheel that the sound seemed closer to, and lo-and-behold there was a radial crack. Anyway:

About an hour the service writer called me back, said the car was ready, it was a false alarm, there was no problem with the disk. I told him, politely, to recheck it. I then emailed the Service Manager. He called back about an hour later, apologized, said the disc was sitting on his desk, and so on.

That was the one decent service manager that dealership had; he's now teaching mechanics in a tech college, didn't like the atmosphere.

(I keep trotting that story out, sorry: just stuck in my mind )