Making the Most of My Time with Irene

KevinH1990 · 08-27-2011, 03:03 PM

My brake wear light came on about a week ago, and I placed an order with Pelican last Friday for front brake pads and sensors. The parts came right on schedule.

I decided to spend my hurricane time in my cozy garage replacing my brake pads while the wind howled and trees crashed down around me.

The instructions on Pelican are good. The only delay I encountered was removing the old pad sensor from the car. There is a hinged cover holding the plug in place and it took me about 5 minutes to figure that out.

I put anti-squeal compound on the backs of the pads. The original pads had never squealed, and when I took them out I didn't see any compound on them so I'm not sure that step is necessary.

My compliments to Wayne and his crew. You have a good plan with your technical articles linked to your parts ordering system. I think this is the third project I've done and your parts ordering system makes it fast and easy.

The money I saved will help me repair the damage from the fallen trees in my yard.

marosmith · marosmith's Garage

Move to Oregon, no hurricanes here. Or salt on the road for that matter.

cvhs18472 · 08-27-2011, 03:33 PM

I know that it might not be appropriate but I will be be sound deadening material on the trans tunnel and firewall of my MGB. This storm gives me a great excuse to spend time putting a new interior in the B. Oh ya there might be some wine involved. Ed

Alphaboy1 · 08-27-2011, 03:58 PM

Kevin,

Did you have any pad left when that Brake Wear indicator came on? Also you did not need to replace rotors?

KevinH1990 · 08-27-2011, 04:52 PM

I had some pad left, but I didn't measure it. The sensor (which is just an insulated wire) sits in a vertical hole in the pad. When the pad wears down far enough the insulation is removed from the wire and triggers the warning light. It looks you have quite a bit of warning before the pad material is completely gone.

The rotors were fine. Most posts I read said that you would need a set of rotors with every second or third set of pads. Technically, you are supposed to measure them to be sure. My car has just over 65,000 miles on it (the first owner didn't drive it much.) So, the rotors looked good.

Alphaboy1 · 08-28-2011, 01:38 AM

Thanks Kevin

My Boxster S has 47,000 miles on her and first brake job. My local Porsche Mechanic told me they always replace the rotors which to me is a big waste of money. I will need to tell them to stand down,

KevinH1990 · 08-28-2011, 07:10 AM

You might want to ask them to measure the rotors. Here are them minimum thicknesses:

Front Vented Steel Rotor (Boxster 1997-2004).

22.6mm.

.

Rear Vented Steel Rotor (Boxster 1997-2004).

18.6mm.

.

Front Vented Steel Rotor (Boxster/Cayman 2005-).

26.0mm.

.

Rear Vented Steel Rotor (Boxster/Cayman 2005-).

22.0mm.

I read about 15 posts on several boards, and I think almost everyone found that the rotors would be OK after one set of pads unless you ignored the wear warning and had metal-to-metal contact.

Here's the guidance I found on Pedro's garage:

Since the rotors also wear down, you need to monitor their thickness as well as the thickness of the pads.

You will notice that the rotors start developing a narrow lip on the edge of the rotor.

When this lip gets to be 1 mm, it’s time to replace the rotor.

As a rule of thumb, you should replace the front rotors with every second pad replacement.

Keep in mind that due to the built-in brake bias, the front pads and rotors will wear much quicker than the rears.