Taking Care of Your Vehicle’s Brake Pads

So you understand the importance of braking systems, and brake pads, but where does one start with learning the signs of pad wear, managing the life of the brake pad, and actually changing the part? This issue is actually fairly easy to solve! After no time at all, you will be your own personal family mechanic.image1

How to Measure Replacement Cycle

Brake pads can typically last up to 80,000 kilometers on some automobiles and have been known to wear in as little as 16,000 kilometers on others. The length of time in between changing your brake pads commonly depends on your driving style, the quality of your brake pads, vehicle weight and driving conditions. All these elements make things more difficult to determine the most appropriate replacement cycle.

The visual method of checking the brake pads for wear below 1.5mm (2/32 of an inch) will certainly ensure that you’ll understand the pad needs to be replaced before the metal wear indicator can cut into the rotors, resulting in additional damage and higher replacement expenses. As the original thickness of brake pads is 10mm in general, it is recommended to replace them for the new one when the thickness becomes less than half of the original. However, especially aged cars with no regular maintenance cycle tend to use up brake pads until the brake pad warning sign lights up on the dashboard indicator.

Pad new & old

When the thickness of brake pads becomes below the above-mentioned limit; 1.5mm, the carbonization of the pad material is accelerated and ends up with the enormous decrease in stopping power, which will sometimes put the drivers in extreme mental stress and crucial danger because the brake simply does not work properly! It also affects other braking system parts negatively, which leads them to shorten their product lifecycle.

Dangers of Disrepair

If we keep running the vehicle without changing brake pads with the thickness below 1.5mm, the important role of slowing down the vehicle is gradually ruined, resulting in critical damage to your vehicle braking system as a whole.

The following negative phenomena generally will appear:

1. In the case of disk brakes, the rotors are aggressively attacked by the extreme thin brake pads together with the pad’s pressing holders in the brake calipers and the surface of the rotors is scratched and becomes uneven, by which decreasing their effectiveness.

2. The metal wear indicators also attack the rotor surface; both the rotor and indicator itself are damaged.                 

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3. The brake oil is exposed to the extreme heat due to the unexpected friction between the brake pads and the rotors. It diminishes the lifespan of the brake oil as well. The phenomenon is so-called “Vapor Lock”, meaning that the overheating of brake calipers and pads leads to the boiling of brake oil to the extent that it contains air (vapor) in the oil. The air in the brake oil diminishes the braking power, which is generally called “Brake Fade”.                                                                                 

4. The entire brake system consisting mainly of brake calipers, pads, rotors, linings, brake pad warning sensor (not for all), linings, brake oils and hoses. Each part has different lifespan due to the difference in raw materials used. Most of them are heat-resistant because the physical stopping power generates lots of heat. It is said that when the brake pads run thin, and become carbonized, the heat damage to other parts is accelerated.                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

In other words, most of the important parts of the brake system such as rotors, calipers, brake hoses, pressure plates, and brake linings all start wearing faster than the originally-designed lifespan of each part. It literally leads to a total collapse of braking system in the end. It is a common the cause of traffic accidents on account of the extreme wear of brake pads, and the inability to stop the vehicle. It is cheaper, and safer, to properly maintain a vehicle and don’t leave these tasks unfinished until it is too late.

Brake Pad 2 #3 after until it is too late wheel

How Be Forward Can Help You

Be Forward’s auto parts section has wide variety of new and used parts for a multitude of vehicle makes and models. In the brake and suspension section, approximately 46,000 items are always in stock for sale. All delivered from Japan and other distribution locations in African countries such as Tanzania and Zambia. In regard to brake pads, we deal mainly with Toyota’s systems, with up to 135 different types of brakes for disk brake systems are available.

The MK brake pads are proudly made in Japan as OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturing) brakes for many car models, not serving only domestic cars, but also cars from abroad.  The official name of the manufacturer is MK Kashiyama Corporation. Thanks to the relationship we have been building up with them for years, we are able to provide you with reasonable discounted prices between 33% and 35% less than suggested retail prices. It has long been thought that only genuine replacement parts are of higher quality, but this misconception is simply just not true; OEM parts such as MK brake pads are more committed to the quality of their product and longer life, as they are made in Japan under strict supervision that comply with ISO (International Organization for Standardization) certified standards.

If you are looking for brake pads other than Toyota cars, please consult with us by mail or phone so that we can find the most suitable and reasonably-priced high performance brake pads from MK or other OEM manufacturers for you. We do our best to meet the needs of our customers as always.