While 90% of y'all are off doing the Dragon, I stayed home and replaced my front pads and rotors. This was my first time doing anything more brake related than holding a flashlight for my husband, and the only thing I needed his assistance with was getting those blasted rotors off!!! Did a test run and everything works great - no squeal, no shimmy, no air in the brake lines, woo hoo!!!! Thanks to Octane Guy and others posting all those great DIY instructions here and elsewhere on the web!

I did notice something that I thought odd but might be normal, but being that I've never done this before myself I'm not really sure so I figured I'd ask the hall of wisdom here and you'll tell me. On both wheels, the outside pads were worn to around .2 mm, which is why I changed them obviously. The early build R53s (and I assume R50s too?) don't have brake sensors, so this was another reason why I didn't want to let this go any longer. However, the inner pads (the ones that clip to the piston) had maybe 25% of the pad material left. The wear pattern and the amount of material left on the inner vs. outer pads were almost exactly identical on both wheels. Is this normal? If so, why? If it's not normal, what would cause this?

I have 45K on the vehicle and like to think I'm a spirited driver but in comparison to most people here I'm a wuss, thus at least one reason why this is the first brake job on the vehicle. Back pads and rotors still have a way to go before they need replacing.

BTW, I replaced the original OEM with Mintex Redbox (to reduce dust) and Balo rotors.

 

That is odd. Usually the inside pads wear more. Assume because of the difference in temperature. Mine are usually a couple mil different. Not the amount you mentioned.

Alan

 

Need to ensure the caliper is correctly floating on th mounting points.

 

lowb35,
I did a front brake job over the weekend and noticed the same thing. Mine is an 02 MCS. I noticed the pins that allow the calipers to self center were dry. After all, it is a 5 year old car with 62k on the clock.After cleaning everything up, I made sure they were lubed with high temp grease. I think this is what caused uneven wear. I hope you flushed the system with fresh fluid, a very necessary step. All said, I thought this was an easy job, except even jacked up, the parts are still pretty darn close to the ground. Not much room to swing a torque wrench. The rears still look like they have about 60% pad remaining. I used after market German made Zimmerman rotors and Pagid semi metalic pads trying to reduce brake dust. Total cost $182 and about an hour of my time.

Motor On
MB

 

Thanks for your input. I did notice that the rear part of the caliper was sitting WAY back on the caliper pins; they were recessed much further in than when I put it back together. Hopefully it will be better now but I will keep an eye on it. I did not flush my brake fluid b/c it was flushed at my Inspection I service (not quite 9 months ago), esp. as brake fluid and levels looked ok and no air is in the brake lines, but I plan on having it flushed within the next month or two when I also get my cooling system flushed - that is definitely due and I don't want to go through another Louisiana summer without it being done. I have a local mechanic who I trust to do this since this may be a little bit out of my league. Maybe he will let me watch and learn, lol.

I almost went with the Pagid pads but decided on the Mintex for the same reason - to reduce dust. So far they are as advertised. I don't know as if they're necessarily generating less dust but it's a light gray and hardly noticeable compared to stock. From what I understand the Zimmerman and Balo OEM replacement rotors are almost identical since along with ATE and Brembo they are OEM brake manufacturers for BMW, unless you got the slotted rotors of course. That's why I went with the Balo because they looked to be comparable quality with original OEM and I found them for a decent price. My total cost was $124 - $35 for the pads, $84 for the rotors, $5 total shipping (the rotors shipped for free).

I found the same thing about not having a whole lot of room to use a torque wrench - esp. on the 16 mm bolts holding the caliper to the strut assembly. I have several torque wrenches and fortunately had a shorter one that goes up to 40 Nm that was sufficient for the caliper pins.