If you really want long brake life, break that bad habit of accelerating towards red lights that you had enough momentum to reach by just coasting.
And in Boston that means your car will last about 5 months because someone’s going to ram it from behind or cut you off that you’ll have to swerve into a ditch. Good luck though.
Long ago in popular Mechanics there was a survey of long life cars. On owner was a cattle dealer in the Mid West, who travelled all over rural areas and did one brake job in 170,000 miles!
My wife is a vigorous driver and brakes much later than she should. As a result, she’s harder on brakes than I am. In Italy it’s customary to brake at the last possible moment; as a result, Italian cars have good brakes, one of few feature I admire about them.
And in Boston that means your car will last about 5 months because someone's going to ram it from behind or cut you off that you'll have to swerve into a ditch. Good luck though.
Just about every lead-footed aggressive driver I have ever met seems to use a version of the above statement as a cop-out to rationalize the way they drive, including the rich kid in my high school who totaled the muscle car his daddy bought him and then a month later totaled the replacement car that the insurance company bought him. The insurance dropped him and for the longest time, the only vehicle he could insure (at high rates) was a old pickup truck with a inline six and three-on-the-tree.
I’m still trying to figure out how surprising a tailgater by gradually slowing down will cause him to rear end you. God forbid you surprise him by slowing down suddenly by hitting the brakes.
Anyway, I broke myself of the habit of late braking, allowing the car to slow down naturally and using the brakes to get rid of that last 20-25 mph or so residual speed. My car is eight years old and has 145,000 miles on it. Nobody has rear ended me or run me off the road.
And, my OEM brake pads still have about 60% of the brake lining left.
Boston drivers tend to be a little on the aggressive side, likely due to the cattle trail derived surface roads they have there. Been there, done that. But maybe the OP doesn’t live in Boston.
I have never stepped foot in Boston nor do I have any plans to, but I suspect that even in Boston, you don’t have to be the biggest idiot on the road.
Sounds like a city custom made for hybrid cars with regenerative braking.
The problem I had with my previous car ('88 Accord) and starting to get with my current '06 Matrix is when the pads get about 50% worn the rotors act up when they get hot.
They make a groaning sound if I have to brake for more than a couple seconds from highway speed; like going downhill.
There’s no pulsation to suggest warping. The rotors don’t look rusted or deeply grooved.
On the Accord this happened ~70k miles; the Toyota is doing it at 58k miles and I have new rotors and pads on order.
It seems to coincide with my getting a job I bicycle to; and now drive only 2-3 times a week.
Around here the rear disc with a drum cast in for ebrake shoes is a real salt trap. The rears only last half as long as the fronts. The salt plats havoc with the brakes anyway, you are grinding rust off the rotors the first couple of stops every time you drive the car for 6 months of the year.
The rear rotors on my 2012 Camry are 1/2 inch smaller than the front. The front rotors are almost 3 times thicker. The pads for the rear are MUCH smaller.
I'm still trying to figure out how surprising a tailgater by gradually slowing down will cause him to rear end you
Because so many are on their cell phones they may not notice you. There doesn’t a day go by there isn’t some vehicle rear-ended in the Boston area. Rt 128 (aka 95) and inside the beltway into Boston I try to avoid like the plague. I take the MBTA into Boston when I can.
To bring it back to brake…
Someone said they get very high mileage on their brakes. I’ve found (one example only) that low usage results in a rusted out rotor. My last set was replaced because they rusted through in spots. Mechanic said he could see holes all the way through them.
Was that low usage as in driving without needing to brake much or low usage as in the car sits parked for weeks at a time? I had a rotor rusting problem with a Moto-Guzzi motorcycle that sat all winter.
Yeah, it would sit 3-4 days about once a week. And I do brake gently.
I guess for longest brake last, you have to drive it once a day, brake hard once only (to clean the rust off).
From my vast personal experience (lots of driving, lots of cars, and lots of parking), much has to do with your climate what’s in your air, (humidity-wise and chemical-wise) and what’s on your roads, and significantly the particular qualities of the steel in your rotors.
I park vehicles outside for months at a time without moving them and have no significant brake rotor rust issues, nor problems with brake pad longevity.
In our long, salty winters however, one cannot drive a vehicle and then park it more than about 2 days without driving it again to clean the rotors or rust will become an issue.
CSA
BillRussell: The VW Passat. When they first appeared my somewhat warped sense of humor created a weird scenario where I was behind one doing the speed limit and passed it. Soon explaining to the officer who asked why I passed a car that was travelling the speed limit I would answer: “When I came up behind it there were chrome letters on the back spelling PASSAT so I did.”
@sgtrock21 here are a couple more car jokes for your arsenol.
Up in da swedish country of MN dis guy need to get to duluth. Now he asked the greyhound bus driver, as he was not sure he was boarding the right bus, “dus dis bus go to dulut?”
Driver anwers no it goes beep beep like al the other busses.
So this guy was driving down the road and gets pulled over, he says I was like do I go straight or turn around, and officer the sign clearly said NO U TURN, so I did.
Officer “Didn’t you se the yield sign?” Yah I saw the Yeild sign, I yelled as loud as I could and he still hit me!
Now my wifes ford windstar avereged 35k on brakes, my trailblazer 85k
@sgtrock21
"When I came up behind it there were chrome letters on the back spelling PASSAT so I did."
Tell me you weren’t driving a Yugo! (Yugo Passat). 
CSA
texases: I just now went outside and checked my Kia’s 4 wheel disks. The rears have integral parking brake mini drums but are about 1 inch smaller diameter than the fronts. There seems to be no standardization.
B.L.E.: I have for a few decades treated the throttle and brakes as the equivalent of electronic rheostats, not on and off switches. My brakes and clutches last almost forever. My first vehicle when I started a commercial driving job (courier) in 1979 was a 1976 Ford Pinto station wagon M/T. It was the last M/T car (there were M/T heavy trucks which I later drove) in the fleet and had a fresh clutch and brakes. 30,000 miles later the company mechanics scheduled it for brake and clutch replacement. They were amazed when both were in nearly new condition and asked how I was able to accomplish that. My answer: “I actually know how to drive a clutch (since 13 years old) and use brakes”. I was then always the company mechanics “favorite son”.
@“common sense answer”
The only way a Yugo is going to pass a Passat, is if the Passat is broken down on the side of the road
I wouldn’t pick either of those 2 vehicles, but at least the Passat is well equipped and has much more power than a Yugo
oldtimer 11: My Kia’s 4 wheel discs are similar. The rears are about 1/2 inch smaller in radius which is about 1 inch smaller in diameter. The fronts are about twice thickness of the rears. Since I am very easy on brakes at 40,000 miles they are 80% of new.