Hi All,

I was quoted $850 to change my front brakes and rotor with OEM parts at a local mechanic shop. This is just too much. Any other cheap alternatives available?

2013 GS350 RWD FSport

Thanks,

Tony

 

Centric Rotors isn't too bad on pricing. Check tire rack or Autoanything

 

Brakes and rotors are expensive. You should expect to spend upwards of $450 on the parts if you are changing all rotors/brake pads. You have RWD? F-Sport?

I have and recommend Akebono brakes and ATE PremiumOne rotors if you go non-OEM and your shop can get them for you (although not sure if they make compatible products for F-Sport RWD models if thats what you have).

The price difference from OEM vs. aftermarket may not be that substantial depending on where you are sourcing your parts. You should check online with MyLParts.com and HouseOfLexus.com to see how much they charge for OEM parts. Then maybe the local shop can give you a quote on just the labor if you bring your own parts.

 

hm ... 1 second search

 

I think when I speced the oem parts out on mylparts it was like 312 bucks or so for a full set of front pads and rotors.

-Mike

 

You can get the pads and rotors from ebay genuine lexus parts and get them changed at a decent shop for 300 max.

 

If you're handy... do them yourself. This is from DIY Dan, a member of Club Lexus.

 

The fronts, particularly, don't look that hard at all... the rears have a couple extra steps/parts but nothing major.

-Mike

 

I've hears people saying it takes more time jack the car up and remove the wheels than it does to change the front pads..rotors obviously a little more involved

 

that's true. I looked at the YouTube video and did it less than 30 mins. Still don't know why the dealer or any mechanic charges so much.

 

Do you really want cheaper, or do you want inexpensive?

To me 'cheaper' means: crap, junk, poor quality, second-rate, third-rate, substandard, low-grade, inferior, shoddy

 

I put new Lexus OEM front rotors and pads on my GS today, and got new shim kit and a fitting kit (which includes those H shaped spring plates etc... Stuff cost $352 w/tax Bought some brake cleaner and some miscellaneous crap to help at the local auto parts store, like 28 bucks.

Dan's video is pretty helpful, although IMHO it makes it look too easy. I think with GOOD appropriate tools and a good impact wrench you can probably get it done in an hour, but I took about 2 hrs or so and then another half hour for a road test, which turned out great. You also gotta spend time cleaning the junk out of the caliper, etc Next time I can probably bang it out in an hour now that I know how to do it. Of course admittedly some of the time today was hunting tools in my house as well as drinking water/taking short breaks because it was hot out today and I was working up quite a sweat...

I still had a few mm on the pads left but they looked pretty glazed over, just wanted to get it done. I probably could have reused my existing rotors but at 92 bucks apiece was easier to just replace.

You must have a Torque wrench to properly set the caliper bolts back on. (57 ft lbs iirc( And taking them off is a total pain in the ***, you will need a hammer or breaker bar, I got lucky and I had a breaker bar which was just small enough to fit in the wheel well and still allow me to use it to break the bolts free.

Useful tip- PAY ATTENTION to the pads when you pull them out, if you keep them intact you can see how the shims go together, and the fact that the rubberized one goes on the back of the actual brake pad.

Also, if you can't get the rotor to come off, and you don't have the bolts to fit in the "assistance hole" an old school wheel puller will work, but don''t just crank on the wheel puller, tension it up several turns and then give the rotor a few whacks with the hammer and it'll pop right off.

-Mike

 

Because they can, and it's a car tying up shop time, after a point "time is money." So you figure an expert bangs this out in an hour being cautious (pads and rotors), between the actual labor and overhead for their building, lift, tooling, consumables, electricity, heat in a leaky garage in the winter, etc, they're probably going to want at least $100-200 over parts cost to do it. Ya gotta charge what a service is actually worth, otherwise you end up selling yourself short, and you end up spending inordinate amounts of time on stuff that just isn't profitable. I work on computers for a living, same concepts in service. Even though wiping and reloading an OS on a computer "easy", you still can't charge someone $20 for it and actually expect to make decent money with that kind of business model. I get like 90 bucks to show up and then it varies afterwards. Every person has gotta decide what their time etc is worth, in what context, etc. Like if I have a night job if I'm not making at least like $90-200 in that evening service call, it literally isn't even worth me showing up. I'd rather go to the gym or something, lol.

Also given what I went through today, working on mine when I was all done you know what the first thing I said to myself was? "This isn't that hard, HOWEVER, I can easily understand why a dealer gets like $600+ for this. " It all became pretty clear to me in that moment.

-Mike

 

I work in IT and you made some very good points

 

Where can I find cheap OEM rotors/pads as the one i see on Amazon is for $555? Or are there less expensive options? My mechanic is willing to charge me $100 labor if i buy the parts myself so I am going that route since its not much and save me time and to gather tools that I do not hav.e

https://www.ebay.com/itm/LEXUS-OEM-FACTORY-F-SPORT-FRONT-BRAKE-PADS-AND-ROTOR-SET-2013-2015-GS350-2WD/252855946447?fits=Year%3A2013%7CModel%3AGS350&hash=item3adf638ccf:g:Y74AAOSw5VFWHrKm

I also found some EBC brakes/rotors for $321 but not sure how they are compare to OEM? I am not racing so I rather have pads that last long but of course I wouldn't want to sacrifice braking.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/LEXUS-OEM-F...4AAOSw5VFWHrKm