My brakes work great! :)

I had an opportunity to test them Sunday. I was traveling down a four lane road/highway Sunday night in the second lane. The car in front of me came to a complete stop but it took a second for me to realize he did that because a woman driver was "parked" in the first 2 lanes :eek: :eek:

I hit the brakes and the first thing that crossed my mind was "THERE'S NOT ENOUGH ROOM!!" I hit them harder then the squeeling started! Screeching, big cloud of burned rubber. The back fishtailed and I could have sworn I was going to hit him. At the last second I released the brakes and the car went straight. By that time I had dropped enough speed where I was able to come to a complete stop in the first lane about 5 to 10 feet behind a motorcycle that had stopped.

I couldn't believe how well the car handled. I must have came within a foot or two of hitting that car. Anti-lock brakes would have been nice though.

My heart is pounding just thinking about it. That's a lot of weight to stop!

Danny

I don't think I need any brake work at this time. Rotors are looking good, pads were worn evenly, pedal is firm, fluid (replaced in July) is clear, braking from 70mph to a dead stop is fantastic; smooth and even power at all four wheels. There is plenty if power to spare, so it is easy to work the brakes right up to the rubber breaking point without going into a slip-sliding away panic stop (no ABS for me thanky very much). I will post how much life I get out of the Textars.

Hey,
Some people like abs some don't, some people don't like air bags either. Personally I'm all for them. If your doing 80 on a major highway and some jackass cuts 2 feet in front of you and hits the breaks you don't have time to "ease the brakes in".
ABS saved my ass that day.

Danny

If you had ABS and ESP you would have stopped faster and in a straight line. Traction helpers are a nice thing, even F1 cars would use them if they could.

Have you checked your rear brakes?
 

I ran into this recently on my 87 I bought last year. Front pads had seemed to wear fast (from when the records on previous brake pad job) and at a quick glance, the rears looked ok. When I was doing some rear suspension work and looked close at the rear pads and rotors, it appeared that the brakes were not working as all. When I removed the calipers, I found that the pistons were frozen.

Moral of the story, fast front pad wear could indicate that the rear brakes are marginal. marginality could be due to lots of factors previously mentioned.
Good luck,
Lee

Cheapest source for MB rebuilt calipers from what I've seen is Autozone. They're only around $45 a piece plus $40 or so for core charge. At least that's what they cost for my mom's old 420SEL. I plan to buy from them when I do my SDL's calipers within the next couple weeks. I too plan to also replace the hoses.

Thanks
David

I do get brake dust on my rear wheels. Does that mean my rear calipers are not frozen?

My experience has been that GENERALLY, rear brakes on any car just don't wear as fast, especially in front wheel drive cars. Note that on my 560SL, the calipers/swept area is much smaller and the rotors are not vented. Of course, I get the @#$@ dust on all of the wheels, but the rears are an every 2-3 week cleaning, as opposed to the weekly front cleaning.

I replaced all four of mine with Advance, and they were rebuilt by Cardome, a really big rebuilder, lifetime warrantee (and I kept the receipts). After reading a bit about the "trickyness" of the seals and extremely high tolerances between the pistons/cylinders, I don't see how anyone but the most hard-core would buy a rebuilding kit for $20- unless it came with 0.0001" certified ID/OD calipers, a finish tester, etc.

pagid is sponsoring
 

a porsche at sebring this wekend. hope they last longer under punishment.


walt fire up the satellite and turn up the surround sound sat morning/afternoon/evening!

Brake Pad Wear
 

38,000 mi on Textar (yellow box) front pads & expect to get about about 50,000 mi. And low dust! (approx 75% less dust - yes, there is some brake dust) Mostly Wash.DC driving with some suburban driving. '87 300sdl

10,000 miles is about the least life I would expect for Pagids -- I get 30,000 plus, but then I do mostly country driving.

What kills them the most is hard stops. Depending on traffic, you may be able to learn to stop more gently and use the engine more (don't downshift, just coast more). City traffic, well, you do what you gotta do to keep from hitting the car in front! Easy foot yeilds long pad life.

I would definitely flush out the brake fluid. If it's dark brown, I would also rebuild the calipers as the seals will definitely be rock hard. This causes the pads to rub much more than they should.

Another clue would be pedal feel -- in good shape, you should have a small "mushy" zone between when the pedal starts to firm up as it goes down and when the brakes start to slow the car. This is the seals holding the pistons out from the caliper. If you have a high, fairly hard pedal with otherwise excellent brakes, the seals are hard and no longer retracting the pistons that small amount, and the resultant drag will cause bad milage and excessive pad wear.

Peter