At slow speeds my brakes squeek, loud. Any way to quiet them without swapping out to new pads? My pads have a long way to go before needing replaced.

 

When that was happening to mine, my lovely husband took them off and ruffed them up on the cement and it stopped...whether or not that is a good idea, I dont know. But it worked!

 

You probably have a glaze on them from light use. Go rip down a canyon and use them hard, or just fly off some off ramps at at least 60, then slam the brakes, not to the point of abs kicking in though. . .
Do that a few times and they should be brand new.

Roughing them up works too, but it's not even wear.

Good Luck-

-Steve

 

Rubbing them on cement may not be the best idea. When the brakes on my Landrover Discovery started to squeek really bad, I took off the wheels and brake and gave it a DEEP cleaning. The dealer said it could have been dust build up. I'd try cleaning them off before rubbing them on the driveway.

 

Thanks guys. I'll give them a few hard stops on my way into work shortly and see if that helps.

 

probably gonna get flame-ed for this one...

But 20 years ago, I would sprinkly a 1/4 teaspoon of ajax cleaner directly in the pad area and that would remove the film that builds up and causes the noise...

You take full responsibility if you do this - have no clue if this is good, bad, whatever with respect to BMW and the MINI.... plus the dealers will probably JUMP to deny warranty status just for fun if they can have an excuse.

 

Hitting the brakes semi-hard seems to have quieted them down by about 50%, so, I need to hit them a little harder and hopefully that does the trick.

 

Nice.

3-4 offramp stops should do it.

Good luck-

 

That always worked on my motorcycles... bike breaks squeal worse than car brakes for some reason, and hard braking always seemed to "de-glaze" them (or whatever it does), making them run quiet again. Of course, if you just drive like a maniac ALL THE TIME then it won't return now, will it?