mlacomb

All:

This marks the 2nd year in a row that my 08 ES has had "lack of grease" on the caliper slides and the rotors out of round/warped. Anyone else having this issue?

Last year - front pads, resurface, greased. Rear caliper greased, resurfaced.
This year (today) - resurface both, regrease both.

Now - I'm all about not spending money, but this was at two separate dealerships because I felt I wasn't getting proper service at my initial dealership. Just curious if anyone else has ever run into this on their ES... thinking of just pulling the wheels myself once a year and "regreasing".

cquence

Hi,

How dirty are the calipers? What was the wear pattern like on the rotors and pads? If there was uneven wear, that can be a sign that the slide pins can be sticking or binding from debris. You can test this by removing one bolt on the caliper, pull the caliper up and remove the brake pads, pull the caliper back down and reinsert the one bolt you removed. Test the calipers to see if there is any resistance when it slides.

Also, if you plan to DIY in the future, just be sure you use the proper grease such as silicone dielectric or caliper grease. Do not use bearing grease as this will create problems for you.

Your front rotors have a minimum allowed thickness of 25.0mm and the rears have a minimum allowed thickness of 8.5mm, so make sure the rotors do not go below this or you will need new rotors.

Hope this helps,

electdroid

My pre-owned '07 ES350 started shuddering shortly after I got it so I replaced the front pads and rotors. The shuddering returned after only 5,000 miles and a mechanic advised against turning the rotors saying they wouldn't stay 'true' for long. I do my own brakes so I started investigating the problem on Google and found a wealth of valuable info including a few guys saying that rotor warping is a myth. Here's a couple of the better explanations:

http://www.stoptech.com/technical-su...nd-other-myths

http://www.hendonpub.com/resources/a...etails?id=1787

I had not been taking proper care installing the rotors and torquing the wheel lugs properly and in the right order. I researched pad types too and decided on premium Raybestos ceramic pads and slotted Stoptech rotors. I installed them using a dial guage to minimize rotor runout (.001 inches in my case), carefuy torqued the lugs in the right order and "cooked" the pads as directed and so far so good. My tire guys had way over torqued the lugs previously and I have no idea in which sequence. I'll be torquing my own from now on.
There is a ton of good information out there if you have a good BS sensor and there are good YouTube videos on how to change the pads so give it a try or find a good mechanic who will listen to you and do a proper job. Good luck!

jagtoes

These experiences always make me wonder what could have caused the problem. After 50+ years of servicing all of my cars/trucks I can only remember one car (1966 XKE) where I had a piston seize causing me to brake the rotor. Other then that I usually go for new rotors on the 3rd brake pad change. I never turn rotors and always verify min. thickness. As the technology improved I find I get more miles on a set of pads. I presently have 34K on my 2010 ES and still have about 30-40% of pad life. So my guess is in order to have such high pad wear and distorted/overheated rotors it might be worthwhile to assess your driving habits to see what causes the excessive wear .

NickTee

I want you to consider how absurdly heavy rotors are. Not only are they heavy, but they're rotational weight and that has a significantly larger impact on fuel economy and acceleration compared to static weight.
One hypothesis is that manufacturers may finally be cutting weight in the rotors, but this leads to other issues.

mlacomb

Thanks for all the insight! So, in talking with my new service advisor at length, they're using a different synthetic grease on the slide pins for this go-round of lubrication. At length, I've owned a lot of vehicles and have typically done my own service - and have had two other vehicles lock up pins in the calipers, causing this same issue.

Long and short of it, the grease in the calipers this go round (slide pins, this is not a piston lock up) was burnt and basically non-existent. Advisor says this can be caused more by salt and road grime somehow making its way in and boiling the grease off at high heat, which again - I've seen this on other vehicles. I'll keep an eye on it. I'm not a heavy on the brakes at all; I drive this car like an old man because I know it's not a sports car (I'll save that for my motorcycle) and to only have a year and around 15k miles to have the rotors start to pulse again was very frustrating. At this point the rotor / brake feel is very smooth and the pedal reaction is different due to the fact that the calipers are sliding properly again, providing proper force.

I'll let you all know in a year if the same problem happens; if so I'm going to swap out the rotors (they've been machined twice now, can have an effect on how much heat they can now hold) and scope out the slide pins in the calipers.