Xantia Brake Pad Wear

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addo
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Xantia Brake Pad Wear

Post by addo »

Is this unevenness typical for the UK/Europe, too?

Image Image Image

I was a bit unimpressed with how much variance some pairs had. On the lighter side, the rears lasted over 70,000km.
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Post by Old-Guy »

Uneven wear is pretty normal in my experience, but when it's bad, it's a sign that either a pad has been 'hanging up' or that the caliper is sliding smoothly on it's guide pins.

When changing the pads, make sure that the calipers slide smoothly and more particularly make sure that the seats for the pads in the calipers are clean, smooth and free of rust. Put a faint smear of copper grease on the seats. If the pad with the piston behind it, can't slide smoothly, then the other pad does most of the work, particularly under gentle barking. Then when you brake really hard, the stuck pad moves, and binds until enough friction material has worn away. The process repeats endlessly.

One of your rear pads looks as though you may have the familiar corrosion-between -rear-caliper-and-suspension-arm problem.
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Post by Gammy leg »

Old-Guy wrote: particularly under gentle barking.
So is this why some cars are known as 'Dogs'? :D

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Post by addo »

OK, that nearside rear outboard pad is obviously the one where you suspect corrosion. It looked fine at the interface; there was certainly no visible oxidisation or parting of the two elements. I've just got "tide me over" pads running on the car until the brakes are properly sorted.

For the front outers to wear more than inners, does it suggest the self-adjusters aren't up to scratch? The OSF one was very hard to wind in, but then again the NSF wore most unevenly and that was easy to retract!

Cheers, Adam.
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Post by Old-Guy »

Front inners wearing more than outers is a sure sign of sticking calipers. But the other way round? IMHO it seems more likely to be the outer faces of the discs getting more rusty than the more protected inner faces. Leave the car outside, overnight rain and the following morning, nice shiny discs have rusty brown marks on them. Rust is surprisingly abrasive.

Isn't winter in NSW the 'wet season'?

Can't see that it's anything to do with the self-adjusters as they simply take up the free-play to minimise lag in response and more particularly to keep the hand-brake working.
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Post by falling-out-with-my-car »

I get uneven wear about every three sets of new front pads on my xantia estate, I think it often has something to do with the make up of the pad and how hard/soft they may be.

I drive my car without passengers quite a bit and the pads wear more on the drivers side of the car sometimes, other times they can wear more on the passenger side.

probably more to do with how they are made and the materials they are made with.

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Post by citronut »

i my experiance i find that type of wear on the front's is down to the either the slide's seizing/sticking, or the pad stuck in it's seat,

that rear one is definatly the usual corosion build up between calliper and rear arm, no doubt about it,

if all the callipers are working/moveing as they are ment to, what the car is carrying has nothing to do with front pad wear, but the more weight you have in the back of the car will just wear the rear's down a bit quicker than with no extra weight, you certainly should not get uneven wear,

regards malcolm
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Post by addo »

Good to see some more input on this one. The rear corrosion will be easy to fix with Wurth copper grease on mating faces.

Front calipers I may kit and reassemble while Malc sorts out what I need for the bigger fronts (CJ should be beatifying him for patience with me).

Much as anything, we have a good set of reference photos here in case anyone else starts talking about brake wear on a Xantia...
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