Most car owners do not wait until the alarm to replace the brake pads. During maintenance, maintenance personnel will conduct a simple inspection of the car, and the thickness of the brake pads is the most important one. If it is found to be thin and meets the replacement standards, the owner will be advised to replace it. Brake pads affect safety. Once worn out, there will be no brakes. Therefore, as long as the maintenance personnel suggest that the car owner replace them, most car owners will follow the advice and replace them directly. In fact, brake pads, like other maintenance items, are sometimes required to be replaced in advance. I have seen the earliest brake pads replaced, and they were only about one-third thicker. They look very thick, but they can actually be used for a long time.

So to what extent should the brake pads be worn out and replaced? Usually, the remaining two or three millimeters should be replaced, so estimate the thickness yourself. If you don't know how thick two or three millimeters are, you can also compare it with the height of its alarm plate. If it's about to grind to the alarm plate, it means it needs to be replaced. If the alarm strip has already been worn, there is no need to worry and it can be replaced directly.

It is best to remove the tire to check the thickness of the brake pads, so that the remaining thickness can be seen at a glance and is very accurate. However, in reality, the vast majority of maintenance personnel are unwilling to dismantle the tires. They use a flashlight to illuminate the outside and inspect the outer brake pads, as well as touch the inside brake pads under the car. Generally speaking, experienced maintenance personnel are able to make accurate judgments, and even without removing the tires, the thickness they judge is almost identical to the actual thickness. If there is insufficient experience, there is often a situation of misjudgment. If the actual thickness is still very thick and you judge it to be thin, you will suggest that the car owner replace it. At this point, the car owner will be asked to replace the brake pads that were originally mentioned as still very thick. Of course, this is not to pit the car owner's money, but rather a result of incorrect judgment by the repairman. After dismantling, it was found that there was still a lot of thickness, and the owner had agreed to replace it. As long as the owner did not say so, they would not install the old one again and continue to replace it with a new one. This way, the car owner actually spent a lot of money and didn't need to be replaced.

Some cars with a long mileage may have deep wear on the brake discs. Checking the inner brake pads by touching them with your hands can often cause some maintenance workers to make mistakes in judgment. The brake disc is worn deeply, but only the area covered by the brake pads is worn deeply. The brake pads cannot cover the entire brake disc, so the outermost ring of the brake disc is not worn and is still the original thickness. In this way, a portion of the brake pads will enter the brake disc. Assuming that the brake disc is worn 2 millimeters deep and the brake pads are still 4 millimeters deep, from the appearance, the brake pads are only 2 millimeters deep. Because there are still 2 millimeters left inside the brake disc, it will be mistaken that the brake pads need to be replaced.

Check the thickness of the brake pads yourself. If the thickness is very thick, it can be seen at a glance from the outside, and there is no need to remove the tires. If the thickness is too thin, it is difficult to accurately grasp the thickness as the line of sight is oblique from the outside, and the inner part cannot be seen. Therefore, it is best to remove the tire for inspection. Check the thickness of the brake pads. Both pads need to be checked. Many cars may experience different wear and tear between the two pads, one thick and the other thin. If only one piece is checked and only the thick one is seen, there is a risk of brake pad wear and tear when continuing to use the car.

From: WONDEE Autoparts

2024-3-12