I bought my '99 Expy used in Feb. of '05. It had badly worn/warped rotors on the front and the rears were about two stops away from metal to metal so I changed all four rotors and pads all around. Since then I've put maybe 12k miles on it.

Last week I started hearing a grinding sound when brakings. I assumed since I'd only put 12k on it that they should still be good. I even pulled a wheel off and checked and they looked good to me however it was kinda dark and I didn't get a real good look. I figured that since I live on a gravel road maybe there was a rock stuck in there or something. I didn't have time to tear it apart until yesterday.

Well, I did tear it apart and found that both sets of front pads were down to nothing. The drivers side had no brake lining left at all. The rotors were pretty badly scored on the drivers side, but luckily the passenger was salvagable. Anyway, I'm used to having brakes last at least 30k miles at minimum, my wrangler goes almost 65k without changes in the front (but that's a stick). So, I ask, is this typical wear rates for these things?

I figure its a combination of living on a steep/long hill and a heavy truck with marginal brakes to begin with, but I wanted to see what others were experiencing with thier brakes.

Thanks.

 

Are your front calipers sticking? Are the inside or outside pads worn, or both?

 

Sounds like a sticking caliper to me,. Something is wrong there

 

Nope, both sides were wearing evenly. On the passenger side both pads were pretty even with about 1/32" of an inch material left, on the drivers side, the outboard pad was similar to the passenger side, but the inboard pad was down to nothing. There was only small chunks of pad material left on the backing. The inboard side of that rotor was worn more than the outboard because of that.

 

That must be some hill

I guess if it's steep/long enough and you end up doing 3X the normal amount of braking that could do it, but I still don't think that's right. What brand of pads are you putting on there?

 

it's probably 2 miles of 10% grade.

I'm pretty sure the pads were NAPA mid-grade on NAPA high-grade rotors.

 

I roughly got 16k out of my front pads. The rotors were fine though. For info pads were regualr Bendix ones. The driving conditions were 95% city 5% highway.
I hear that ceramic pads get more mileage than regular ones on these trucks.

 

03/EB/2wd - I got about 16k out of the front and 35k out of the rear. Thats way too soon. All new rotors pads etc....

 

Sounds like a possible sticky caliper piston.

 

I bought my truck with 65k on the clock saw the dealership put brand new pads on the truck all the way around. I just changed my fronts at a little over 101k I drive mostly highway miles. But I was gettting down to metal to metal and I didnt change the rotors they were fine, just the pads and the brakes are fine.