eoren1

Hey,
I just had my car inspected and was told that my left front brake
failed. From what I can make of the summary, it looks like the left front brake force was 0 lbf and the right was 6 lbf (which also is their reported maximum). The rear look like 1005lbf on left, 996lbf on right. All others showed 96-106% on the brake balance.
Called my dealer and drove there immediately. They told me the brake
pad on the left had worn down to 1.5 ?mm and 3 ?mm (not sure if that
is millimeters or centimeters). No comment on the others except to
say they were "fine". The car has 19500 miles on it with mostly city
driving (about 3 miles to work).
The dealership said that it was not unusual for brake pads to need
replacing this early (they quoted 18k-23k with city driving) - is this
right???
Also, what about the huge discrepancy in the left front from the rest
(sorry I don't have precise numbers from the dealer)?
Lastly, they wanted $225 to replace just the brake pads (350 if I
wanted to replace the disk). Should this potentially be covered under
the original warranty as a fault (or should I call around and get a
better deal...or do it myself if anyone can point out a good
information source for how-to).
One more thing, just had the 15k mile check-up 5 months ago, should
this have been picked up then?
Thanks a lot,
E

wonderz

iTrader: (18)

if its 1.5 and 3.. they are probably in mm... even new pads won't be 3cm thick. so you pretty much wore out the pads... you should have hear some noise coming from the brake as a warning that the pads are worn...
either way, you have to replace the pads... if the disk are warp then u gotta replace that too. and you can probably find another shop that charges you less to change the disk and pads if you don't feel like doing it yourself.

Boilermaker1

iTrader: (16)

Yeah, probably. It just goes to show you how close they "inspect" all the stuff they say they do. Take a tip, don't let the dealer touch your car for anything but warranty work. They take your money and give your car no love at all. They're still not going to warranty it because brakes are a wear item, but you can get yourself a new set of pads for $50, have the rotors resufaced and an hour later have new brakes. Honda stock brakes suck. Get a mild aftermarket street pad like Hawk HPS, Axxis Metalmaster or AEM, and call it a day. You'll thank yourself.

lkm

dude, don't be a dummy and DIY. its soo friggin easy! you can prolly get some aem pads or someother ricer pads cheaper than $100 a pair and DIY

coop

brakes are a consumable and not covered by warranty - the uneven wearing is probably a concern. Pad longevity is directly related to your driving style - if you brake hard, you'll wear pads out quicker. Aftermarket shops will always be cheaper than dealer prices OR as others have suggested you could DIY if you're comfortable doing so.

coop

Is your EX equipped with ABS?

Not sure if that complicates DIY or not.

flipBloodracer

i say do it yourself and find some sources in this site...if the rotors has uneven wear or run outs or warps its either youll have to machine your rotors within the minimum thickness and if you cant have it machined because its below minimum thickness its ilegall to machine it then get new sets of rotors. and replacing the brake pads aint that hard to do all you have to do is take pads off then put the new ones in and compress the pistons with the use of clamps. if you cant do it then find somone to do it at a reasonable price...

tinman

OEM pads cost me $50, and it took me maybe 25 minutes to replace them. Front brakes are soooo easy. A little caliper compression tool costs only a few bucks if you don't want to use big pliers to push the piston back in. Dealer wanted about $250 here too. Yeah.....right.

Ronin

Good advice. Although I would not recommend AEM from personal experience. They were my previous pads and lasted me only 31,000 miles ... and that's with LOTS of highway driving. Also, they were very tough on my rotors for some reason ... lots of uneven grooves and warping on my rotors which caused a ton of vibration, even after re-surfacing (Brembo blanks). And they dust like mad.

So I'm currently using PBR/Axxis Metalmasters, with a new set of Brembo blanks. So far, they seem to be better in nearly all aspects of braking compared to AEM. And they don't seem to dust as much. And, they were cheaper ($38) than the AEM's ($43).

And with new Brembo blanks going for only $29 each, I would consider getting those instead of resurfacing the crappy stock rotors.

HappyGilmore

Same thing just happened to me. I went for state inspection, I was told that my brakes are running low. I have 35000 on original OEM brakes. City driving 85%. So I've ordered some brembo blanks and PBR/Axxis like Ronin setup. I will give that a try since I hear a lot of good comments about them.

Pharoh

iTrader: (8)

I've had my car since Nov 2000 and I just replaced my pads a month ago....I drive the car hard as well so don't think it just sits in the driveway all day.

runner1738

iTrader: (2)

i actually jsut had to have my pads and rotors resurfaced today, cause i wore then out so much it chipped the sensor thing that is supposed to make the noise and instead it made a different noise that would come and go, but yea it was like 250 at the dealer , i wish i had gone else where, and have gotten better pads, but so much for that iguess