Rear brake pads first ?

Just went to the dealer for my 24K (really 28K) inspection and they told me my brake pads were 50% used front and 75% used rear. After 25 years driving cars, this is a first for me !
And the dealer tells me it's normal (uhm)

The P5 is automatic and I do a lot of city driving. I expect to have to change the front pads around 24K and the rear pads at 48K.
- It's not my first 4 disk brakes car
- I don't drive with my parking brake on
- I don't drive with my foot on the brakes
- I don't drive slowly
- I do use the compression (yes with the AT tranny)

Can somebody explain ?

Do you brake hard? Maybe it's the EBD getting a bit overzealous.

If I remember correctly, the P5 has on the rear:

- larger diameter discs
- thinner discs
- solid non ventilated discs

Maybe it's one of these factors coming into play?

ABS or no ABS? This is the main question. There's lots of trickery going on with EBD to try to get new cars to use the pads more evenly (i.e. not going through 2 sets of fronts for every set of rears). It would not surprise me if Mazda chose to do most of the very light braking with the rears on ABS equipped cars.

Also, pad material is a witch's brew. I have seen many sets of pads practically dissolve over 30K miles due to manufacturing variances.

Alex

Canadian P5's have standard ABS whereas US spec ones have it as an option.

thats the same with mine....the back wore down faster than the front...in my case...20 percent left on the back...50 on front

Thanks for the input.
I guess the Electronic Brake Distribution system will try to balance the braking and try to keep the car from tipping at low speeds.
How does it work really ... is it trying to do 50/50 front back ?

The brake pad compound mix can probably explain the difference between the back and front wear. I can easily find pads for the front (like KVR) but nothing for the back yet. Do I have options for the rear set ? Are they of the same thinkness as the front pads (never checked).

Thanks again for the information ... My Mazda dealer really deos not know his stuff. They could not give me a decent answer.

P.S. Yes , it's a Canadian model.