Brake Life Milage

Hi,

My Wife and I have a 2017 CX9 with 22,500 miles on the clock, We took it in for a service last week and we were told that it needs new rear brake disks and pads within the next month and was quoted $500 for the work.

Does this sound like normal mileage before needed the brakes replaced or should I be worried about something fishy?

Disc's too, or just the pads. Should just be pads. And normally front ones go first. Disc replacement means they've been damaged which is unlikely.

Spatch20012002 said:

Hi,

My Wife and I have a 2017 CX9 with 22,500 miles on the clock, We took it in for a service last week and we were told that it needs new rear brake disks and pads within the next month and was quoted $500 for the work.

Does this sound like normal mileage before needed the brakes replaced or should I be worried about something fishy?

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Needs within the next month? Is that so they can make their yearly sales numbers before end of year? LMAO!!(laugh)

JPL said:

Disc's too, or just the pads. Should just be pads. And normally front ones go first. Disc replacement means they've been damaged which is unlikely.

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Disks too, at the last service they offered to have them milled down but did't say anything about the pads needing replacement. I would say that 80% of the millage is on the freeway I don't detect any noise or vibrations coming from the rear either.

I can't speak for the CX-9 specifically as I haven't had mine long enough to know what is normal. But as a rule of thumb, most modern cars should go 40,000 to 60,000 miles on a set of brakes unless you are particularly hard on them or regularly tow something. (My previous vehicle, a Mercedes ML550, went 110,000 kms -- 66,000 miles -- on the first set of pads.) And as JPL says, it is normally the front pads that wear down fastest, although most vehicles have larger components in the front to account for this. Either way, it is not uncommon now for discs to be replaced whenever pads are; milling them smooth is not recommended as you certainly don't want the discs to wear out before the pads do.


At just 22,500 miles, and the rear pads needing changing, I'd be inclined to get a second opinion. If they are, indeed, worn down, but the front ones fine, there may be a problem in the way your braking system is apportioning load.

Sounds fishy. You can look at the outer pads yourself. It's kind'a tight, but on the left rear, looking from about the 11:00 o'clock position, you can see the pad and see its thickness. Better, have someone take off the wheel and measure the thickness of the remaining pad material front & back. At about 3 mm expect the squealers (if fitted) to start letting you know that a pad replacement should be in your budget. You can also take a good look at the rotor and, when cool, run a finger across the outer surface (if you do it when the brakes are hot, the burning smell you get is you). If the surface is quite smooth, very minor grooving, it will be fine.

"it needs new rear brake disks and pads within the next month" Sounds like a lie to me. The only way to tell is to measure the thickness. Don't accept anything less.

I had a Volvo that always wore out the rear pads first. That's the only car I've seen that on. The CX-9 might be the same. Unusual but possible.

Spatch, is there any chance one of the drivers of that car rests their left foot on the brake pedal while traveling? That is a habit that can cause rapid brake wear. About mileage...there is no way to tell. If one lives in a hilly area or lots of stop & go traffic, they'll have fast wear. If one lives in wide open spaces where they might only touch the brakes a couple of times in a few hundred miles of travel, they'll have very slow wear.

Please let us all know what you find out. There is no reason to get the work done at a dealership unless that's the best shop you can semi-trust. Keep in mind that the service writers are paid on commission. They only get a paycheck for work they sell to you & me. The mechanic is paid flat rate...so many hours for this job, something else for a different job. For both of them, no work, no pay.

Sounds like the dealer trying to upsell to get add'l work/svc done that may not yet be necessary...last service of my CX9 dealer told me that brakes needed cleaning etc that would've cost $250! At my low mileage I said I'll pass...took it to a tire shop one time to do a rotation (w/c was free btw due to Nokian tires purchasd there) and I told them to check the brakes just to get a second opinion..true enough it wasn't necessary as the brakes were still good almost like new!

As others have said, certainly get a 2nd opinion and ask them to tell you the actual measurements of pad and rotor thickness remaining. Your mileage does seem a bit low, but it's not uncommon now for cars to have brakes needing replacement at 30k-40k miles. It could just be that the rear brakes need to be disassembled, cleaned, and reassembled due to rust/oxidation from living in New England (but this should be an hour of labor or less and definitely not $500).

As for front pads/rotors always wearing out first, that is certainly not always the case with today's cars that have electronic brake force distribution (EBD) that can apply more brake pressure to the rear wheels to help prevent nosediving and fishtailing. On my last 2 cars (2011 VW Tiguan and 2016 VW Tiguan) the rear brakes wore out before the fronts.