VetteDrmr

Saw this mentioned in another thread, but thought this might be useful on its own:

What is the correct sequence to keep pad taper evened out? Swap inner to outer? Outer side-to-side and inner side-to-side?

TIA for the education, and have a good one,
Mike

Bill Dearborn

What I would do is switch the pads from the left caliper to the right caliper. The wear in each caliper is exactly opposite the caliper on the other side. So the outside pad from the left front caliper becomes the inside pad for the right front caliper, and so on.

Bill

longdaddy

that's the process I follow as well. I label my pads as I take them out by sticking little pieces of blue tape on them, otherwise it gets confusing

VetteDrmr

Thanks for the info! Trying to get everything out of what I've got.

Have a good one,
Mike

Aardwolf

I don't swap them side to side, I do swap them from inner to outer. Every track day.

Bill Dearborn

That probably doesn't equalize the taper. If you swap inner and outer on the same wheel you are basically flipping them upside down and the wear pattern will be the same.



Bill

rustyguns

Aardwolf

The leading edge tapers, swapping them like that puts the worn leading edge on the back. I've also found the inboard pad wears more. Swap often, have fun!

rustyguns

Jim 47

You guys should be listing to Bill Dearborn

He really knows what he's doing and he is 100% correct

Those who disagree with Bill ought to take a very close look at the pad ware after a hard day of braking, then take those worn pads off, marking them carefullly to identify the original location and the top and bottom of the pad, then rearrange the pad to the new location that you are planning for that pad, and see if you are actually reversing the ware tendencies or just putting them in the same ware position as before.

If you do this you will find that Bill Dearborn is 100% correct in his annalysis, and those who disagree with Bill are 100% incorrect.

Personally, I have used Bill method for the past 10 years, and know with absolute certainty that he is correct.

Jim Helm

froggy47

There is id to od taper and also leading edge taper. If you are moving the left pads to right & right to left (and keep the leading edges of all pads the same) how does that help anything? Or is it opposite side & flip the leading edge to become trailing edge? But then outside is still outside (pad) and inside is still inside (pad).

I like to just keep them on the same caliper. Inner to outer & leading edge to trailing. It's easier.

longdaddy

that's how I arrived at exactly the same method. I can get the pads to wear down to 10-15% of material left evenly with this method. I still have a piece of paper with notes/diagrams i used to track wear on all 8 pads over several days....

J.Yo

Haaa. I took my sweet time watching Hulu while typing a reply. It would seem a few other forum members have provided the same analysis sooner than me. I'll leave my post here for posterity.


Let's talk this through for a sec, assumming we are talking about the OEM calipers.

I have pad wear inconsistencies in three directions-
1. Direction of rotation - leading to trailing edge taper.
2. Radially - inner to outer radius (due to caliper flexing) - nothing much we can do about this, aside from buying new / alternate calipers.
3. Inboard/Outboard pad - my outboard pad wears faster than my inboard pad.

I would think I could solve issue #1 and #3 by swapping the inboard and outboard pads on the same side of the car. First, this would put the thicker pad on the outside, thus evening out the thickness issue. Second, this would put what was the leading edge of the pads to the trailing edge.

Wouldn't this give us the most even wear, rather than swapping left side to right side of the car?

stevensa

This thread is all kinds of confusing, so many different opinions!

longdaddy

ha sorry.

basically if you think about it, swapping left to right will do the best job at equalizing the taper, while swapping only inside-out on the same side will equalize the wear but will not equalize the taper.

the best approach is a combination of two, but if you have to stick to one, Bill's is superior in terms of minimizing the "long pedal" issue.

here's the complicated version
the pad on the inside (#1) has most wear and most pronounced taper. if you put it on the outside (same caliper) after it starts tapering, it will not "straighten out" enough by the time the pad you stuck on the inside (#2) gets same amount of use. so you wait longer (and let the "second" pad go to crap) or swap them again and have pad #1 get even worse. so you are reducing the rate of taper, but you will never have "straight" pair anymore, they will keep getting worse although they lose material at a similar rate.

now consider the method Bill and I use:

since you are swapping #1 pad to the inside on the other wheel, it will "untaper" as fast as it tapered, so it it tend to be flatter, on average although it will lose material faster than #2.
this can be addressed by "occasionally" swapping them on the same caliper, but you should catch the moment when they are as straight as possible and you will only be able to achieve that with Bill's method.

additional bonus is that you are compensating for possible differences in wear rate between the wheels.

yes, I am obsessive compulsive optimizer, why do you ask?

KNSBrakes

good tip

I was just flipping them in the same caliper but still ending up w/ a good bit left over in 1 or more.

They are pretty darn thin at 0.575". I wonder if they could be made a bit thicker since we use no shim.

flink

I don't follow a strict formula. I observed and learned the car's wear patterns. Then each time I pull the pads out to inspect them, I put them back in in such a manner that the wear pattern will cause the pads to even up.

I do this to avoid a long pedal (from piston cocking) as much as to extend the pad life. I now get nice even wear, whereas the previous owner got



(Wilwood superlites on an e36. Neither the wilwoods nor the e36 brake mounting scheme impress me much).

kwhiteside

Sure is nice not having to pull the bracket with those wilwoods to get the rotor off.

stevensa

See now I am lost a bit. Your method of swapping inside to inside on opposite calipers makes sense to me, however the original post by Bill does not state the same process. I think this is where most of the confusion in this thread comes form.

Bill Dearborn

That is why I included the picture of my tapered pads. It clearly shows the stock pads do not have a leading edge taper issue. On the outboard pad the leading edge is thinner and on the inboard pad the leading edge is thicker. The taper goes diagonally across the pads with the inboard and the outboard being the exact opposite of each other. Flipping upside down doesn't do anything.

Bill