Front & rear Brakes

Maintenance/Repairs
1

Wife has 2017 Jeep(not grand) cherokee. Have someone doing the front and rear brakes. He did the pads and mentioned something about the rotors. THought he sid “i did the rotors”. I will check exactly. Few questions.

  1. THere is no more cutting rotors is that correct? They would need to be replaced
  2. What determines if they need to be replaced?
  3. How do I know he actually replaced them. He could show me the old ones but then how the heck would I know they are mine.
  4. ROUGHLY speaking how much shoud should a front and rear brake job cost with and without doing rotors? Material included
    Thank you very much
2
  1. Hardly anyone resurface brake rotors
  2. The measured thickness - of course you did not say how many miles on this vehicle
  3. Pay a shop to verify they are new
  4. And I for one and not even going to guess at price because I don’t no where you are or what the shop hourly rate is which might be different at each shop

If you have doubts why did you go there in the first place.

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3

Thank you. Long Island New York.

4

Can you see the rotors through the wheel? If so, you can likely feel the friction surface if the rotor. If it’s rough, then it wasn’t resurfaced or isn’t new. You can also feel the friction surface at the edge. If there is a lip, then it’s the original rotor without resurfacing.

When I did my own brakes, I always replaced the rotor when replacing the pads. The cost was under $50 each and all I had to do was spray with brake cleaner and wipe them off. At $150/hr or more for labor, new rotors makes sense and is likely the most cost effective solution.

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  1. Rotors are now commonly replaced due to the comparative low cost of new rotors vs the labor cost of redoing the brake job if the rotors are later found to be found worn, warped or bad.
  2. Visually signs of grooving, cracks or buildup at the rotor edge are hints but the real test is measuring the thickness (at additional labor cost).
  3. Are the new rotors smooth, shiney with no rust or pitting? Then they’re probably new.
  4. Cost of a brake job depends on the specific vehicle, the materials used and the mechanic’s experience and labor rate. A quick look at Rockauto for materials alone, I’m seeing prices prices ranging from $60 to several hundred dollars. (yeah, I know I could be comparing apples to oranges but it’s only a quick look).

Bottom line, brakes are pretty darned important and something you’d want “done right” so to quote Volvo-V70, “If you have any doubts, why did you go there in the first place?”

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6

You had someone do brakes?
Does receipt for work say parts and labor?
Or was this cash deal?
A car that won’t start is annoying.
A car that won’t stop is a bit more than annoying.

7

Rotors are replaced because the surface finish of the rotors must match the surface finish of the brake pads to prevent brake noise.

To machine rotors so the surface finish is correct is hard to do and time consuming.

So it’s cheaper to install new rotors which already have the correct surface finish.

https://www.aa1car.com/library/2003/bf110322.htm

Tester

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8

this is an excellent question.

9

Well I know him through someone so that’s the extent of it. I’m leary in general or service people. I know not all but I’ve been duped before. Well he said $750 for the front and rears inclusive of the rotors. He said he didn’t use cheap stuff and the rotors alone were $110 each for either front or rear(I forget) and $90 for the others . He said he actually took money off the labor. Thanks for the replies I do appreciate it.

10

I think one reason they don’t machine rotors anymore is they make them the thickness necessary for the job, but no thicker to save material costs. It’s our throw away society at work.

11

It saves weight as well as money, the rotor wears as the pads wear and rust like mad in the snow belt. I have done brake jobs because the rotors were so badly corroded not because the pads were thin. New rotors prevent a come-back for noise or pulsation so virtually all shops do rotors sith new pads.

My 2001 Saab’s rotors and pads were at low limit at the same mileage both front and rear. Perfect wear rates at 36K miles. My Audi’s rotors were perfectly smooth and barely worn when the pads needed replacing at 47K. I only did pads.

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12

On the other hand, unless you have the machine to resurface rotors on the car, it is just as much work to take them off so might as well put new on. The thinner they are, the easier they walk. After paying for brakes who wants to go back in a few months with pulsating brakes? Or do it yourself and you’ll know.

13

Here’s an idea, how about taking a close up picture of the wheels so we can see the brake rotors through them…

14

$750 seems reasonable for all four wheels including rotors and pads. Did he change the brake fluid too? Also, this price is for a commercial operation, not a mobile mechanic or someone that works in his back yard. I’m not suggesting you were take, but a mobile mechanic doesn’t have the overhead that a commercial shop does.

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15

Car designers these days prefer rotors just beefy enough to do the job for the pad life, b/c any more than that means more weight. So rotors are seldom resurfaced now, just replaced when the pads wear out. New replacement rotors are pretty cheap, so there’s not much downside.

If desiring to retain the rotors, their serviceability is assessed by

  • visual inspection, looking for abnormal wear patterns or rust pock marks
  • thickness measure, must pass the minimum allowed thickness test
  • warping, must pass a maximum allowed run-out

I doubt your mechanic would tell you the rotors were replaced when they weren’t. Given how inexpensive they are, not much bang for the buck with that sort of deception. New rotors look new, don’t have much rust on the edges, and they measure a like-new thickness. So that’s one way to tell. You could of course mark the edge of the rotor and check if the mark is still there afterward.

There are a few things that can go wrong with this job. First, they can forget to clean the rotor of all its surface rust inhibiter before installing it. When that happens the brakes don’t stop well, and to remedy this error, while they can just clean the rotor, they also have to replace the new pads again b/c they are contaminated with rust inhibiter. Second, they can damage something – including the ABS system – when they retract the caliper pistons. Experienced mechanics know how to avoid both problems. Third, the brakes may not as good as they were at first b/c the pads haven’t yet bedded to the rotors. Ideally the shop would do this for you, but many don’t. Ask them if they did it, or if they didn’t, to instruct you how to do it.

Rather than worrying about shop work, next time before taking your Jeep to a shop ask around for which shop in town has the best mechanics who are Jeep knowledgeable. Ask friends, relatives, fellow church-goers, fellow Jeep owners, etc, which shop they use.

Pad/rotor replacement is usually an easy and very common shop job. I expect you won’t experience any problems at all. There’s a website that will provide a cost estimate for this job, Google “Repair Pal”, or something like that. I’d expect around $1000 for all four wheels, pads and rotors. Best of luck.

16

Well I’ll tell you what I picked up the car felt the road is they were super smooth looked brand new nice and meaty and beefy and the car felt unbelievably good when stepping on breaks.

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17

How was it stepping on the brakes ?

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Felt great. Not sure what it suppose to feel like but when braking starts pedal is much higher. Only have to tap it a little for braking ot start.

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19

Just like that. New pads and rotors are thicker, meaning that you need less pedal travel to engage the brakes than when the old, worn brakes were used.

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20

$759 for front and rear would be reasonable in Buffalo, seems like a bargin in Long Island.

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