mustang65fbk

Hello all, I'm new to the honda forums and this is my first post so go easy on me. I have a 2006 honda civic ex 2dr with just over 100k miles. I'm the second owner of the car, I believe these are the original brakes and the car is bone stock with no upgrades of any kind as it is just a daily driver. I heard a whining sound near the passenger side rear wheel so I took it to Les Schwab to get a free brake inspection. Anyhow, the guy at Les Schwab said I needed new brake calipers? Now I always thought it was more of a get new brake pads and possibly rotors if they're warped or any metal on metal? At least that's how it is for my mustang. The guy said the right rear was at 1mm left for what I'm guessing he meant as pads and the left rear was at 3mm left. So are the pads unable to be attached from the calipers and do I actually need new ones or? Either way, I'll probably do the brakes myself but wanted to make sure there wasn't some reason as to why I needed to get new calipers if I actually need them. The other thing that makes me think foul play is that they said the rotors looked good but they wouldn't be able to tell for sure until they started the brake job. Maybe they want to try and pressure you when you bring in the car for repairs? I don't know. Anyway, thanks for any input.

- Blair

brags

the garage you whent to may be taking you for a ride.
simply jack the rear up of your car place jackstands underneath release
Ebrake - (hand brake) and turn the rear wheels by hand do they turn ok?.. if
they do, you don't need calipers take the wheels

off loosen the slider
pins on the caliper inspect the pads are they down in material? do the
slider pins have any grease left on them? what do the roters look
like? that's what you need to look for?

mustang65fbk

so sometimes when I drive or go in reverse there is a little grinding noise, is that what you are referring to when talking about spinning the tires?

ezone

Chain stores generally try to sell you every brake part possible, there's a lot of profit at stake.

The general rule of thumb is to stay away from chain stores, and never ever get brakes done at any chain store that has the word 'brakes' in the name.

Ask this same question on craigslist auto forum and see what answers you get about chain stores. https://forums.craigslist.org/?forumID=5

They may get your car, take it all apart ("HOSTAGE SITUATION"), THEN hard sell you everything, citing you are a road hazard, a legal liability, a danger to your family, a menace to society, you will crash and burn, you will crash into a bus full of blind nuns holding babies on their way to the orphanage.

It pays to be a regular at a shop/mechanic you trust.

I often see receipts from local chains that are for brake jobs in the 5-700 range PER AXLE.
I work for a dealership. Our ordinary brake jobs are generally in the 200-225 range for pads and resurface rotors. We do not replace stuff *****-nilly. There must be a legitimate reason for us to replace brake parts in our shop.

I'd venture to guess yours only needs a set of pads.
You must inspect your calipers and all other parts and determine if they are serviceable or not. All the rubber boots intact, not torn or damaged? Slide pins not seized? Caliper piston retracts ok?
Here in the rust belt, I deal with pads that get bound up due to rust in the caliper brackets (our #1 cause of extremely uneven pad wear). A bit of disassembly, a wire wheel and flat file, and they can be in good shape again.

Yes, many times there must be disassembly in order to figure out what is going on.
Example: Rotor thickness must be measured, sometimes it is not possible without taking stuff apart.
In the shop I work for, FREE brake checks (visual check only) are somewhat expected and we normally won't do any teardown just to tell you "it's due for a brake job". We need some commitment out of you before we invest a lot of our time in a complete teardown for a deeply thorough inspection, and sometimes there simply is stuff that is not discovered until the actual job is underway..


Speaking of a bus full of nuns holding babies....

ezone

Oh yeah, "1mm of pad material remaining" means that SHOULD be the wear indicator squealing you heard.

brags

im saying to jack up the rear of your car on Jackstands and release the
hand brake so your brakes on the rear are off then turn the wheels by
hand do the wheels turn easy? or is one or both really hard to turn?