Front brake rotors warped after 15000 miles

My 2015 Tacoma 4x4 needs the front rotors to be replaced after 1500 miles. Nasty shimmy braking at about 50 mph going down hill. The dealer is gonna make it right. Anyone else out there have this issue?

 

This " Shimmy " is caused by brake liner material being deposited unevenly on the rotor. The rotors are not warped. This is caused by improper bedding of the brakes and can usually be corrected by the user.

https://www.zeckhausen.com/catalog/index.php?cPath=6446_6443

 

An out of balanced front wheel causes the same effect.

 

Read their instructions for bedding new brakes. How do you clean the pad material if they were improperly bedded the first time?

 

Obviously there is something wrong with the brakes. Could be seized causing them to be rubbing.
Make sure you get an answer as to what was causing the problem and don't just accept them turning the pads and rotors.

 

I've used the Zeckhausen procedure on my past vehicles to fix brakes that were improperly bedded when new. Basically the goal of the procedure is to do repeat hard stops from high speed so that you make everything hot enough to burn off the deposits.

If you do the procedure right, the rotors will get glowing hot and once they cool down they'll have a nice blue/brown color that indicates they've been hardened. At that point, they are less likely to form deposits again.

 

Thanks!

 

If you do the procedure, it is important that you avoid coming to a complete stop until the rotors have cooled completely.

I went out and found a section of highway that wasn't very busy because I intended on pulling over onto the shoulder for each stop. You definitely don't want to stop in the middle of the road, and you don't want to rely on stopping at stop signs or traffic lights.

While at full speed (in my case around 70 mph), brake as hard as you can, without engaging ABS, while pulling onto the shoulder. As soon as you're around 5 to 10 mph, speed back up and merge back onto the highway. As soon as you hit full speed, repeat the stopping procedure. Do this a few times and then find some way to drive around for a good 15-20 minutes without coming to a complete stop. What you want to avoid is allowing the brake pads to rest against the extremely hot rotor since that will screw up the procedure.

 

Drive through water recently? Could warp the rotors by sending them hot into cold water.

 

Interesting proces!

 

Go through Post # 1. It has a lot of good links.

 

Can confirm. My rotors had that warped feeling at 10 k, but it is better after I used that procedure.

 

Standard procedure for bedding in brakes.... do it on all my vehicles, makes brakes last longer and stop better over their life. SUPER noticeable on motorcycles where you have fine control with your hands.

 

I took mine in today at 27k for the same issue. Dealer logged it as improperly machined rotors, turned the rotors and replaced pads under warranty. All is good.

 

I feel the need to say, it takes a pretty significant amount of heat to warp a plate of metal like a rotor. Most people do not do this unless they race with high performance breakes or have been doing a lot of mountain driving.

Warped rotors need to be thrown out. You can't "turn" them. What is happening is people usually are slamming on their brakes often enough to heat the rotor and pad so when you come to a complete stop some of the brake pad material burns onto the rotor. Do this enough and the braking surface becomes uneven giving you a shimmy while you drive.

This is why bedding should be done on new brakes. Crates a better, even friction surface for braking.

Warped rotors are NOT the issue 99% of the time. It's become a misused term, leading people to piss away more money in brake shops.

 

To be more specific to what @Jimmyh says above, rotors don't warp.

http://www.stoptech.com/technical-support/technical-white-papers/-warped-brake-disc-and-other-myths

They do get 'warped feeling' from improper bedding and/or low grade pads.

They do eventually wear beyond a serviceable thickness. But since they are harder than pads, that normally takes 2-3 sets of pads.

So, when your tech 'dresses' the rotor, they are basically skimming off the old pad material, and maybe enough metal to smooth out any grooving that has occurred.

The nice thing about the 'on vehicle' unit mentioned above (as opposed to a regular brake lathe) is that it accounts for any run out error that may be in the actual hub assembly. I don't know about recent years, but for a long time the on vehicle method was the only way to turn/clean rotors on a Honda product, because the effort to remove/change them was ridiculous.

 

I take exception to that report as I distorted the crap out of the front rotors on my 2003 Mustang Cobra just by rapidly decelerating to shed 75 mph in 1/3 mile or so--it was the 75 mph between 145 and 70.

It was early summer of 2006, I had been cruising along minding my own business on I-10 Eastbound west of Lake City FL--it was early in the evening--when the "threat detector" went off solidly. My experience with that older radar unit was that I had 1/3rd mile or so before the radar would get a fix, so I dropped it into 5th gear and stood (literally) on the brakes; the brakes made a terrible squawking and cabin filled with putrid smoke; I made it but I'd bet the rotors were glowing cherry red as I went by that cop.

They were warped visibly, looked like big belleville washers...

 

That does not happen.

 

Pics?