Leftie <No (AT) Thanks (DOT) net> wrote in
news:Epuhm.257719$E61.217037 (AT) newsfe09 (DOT) iad:


<snip official reply>




The most revealing comment in the dealership's letter:
"The sensors on the pads have to be in the proper position in order to
work correctly."

The only way I can think how the pads would be improperly installed as
described in that document is that the inner pads would have been swapped
left-for-right.

Swapping left-for-right would have put the squeal tabs (wear indicators) at
the /bottom/ instead of at the /top/, where they should be on your car's
front brakes. This is what I suspected from the beginning.

Disc brake pads tend to wear most at their leading edges (relative to the
rotor's spin direction, not the car's direction), so the wear indicator is
placed there.

In your case, the wear indicator being on the bottom would mean that it
would not function as intended (being on the trailing edge, which ends up
being thicker than the lead edge), and you'd end up down to the steel on
the lead edge of the pads well before the indicator ever contacted the
disc.

Official safety inspectors necessarily must consider certain pre-determined
standards when deciding whether something is "safe" or not, and correct
installation is part of that. If the pads were in fact swapped, then they
were indeed installed wrongly, even if you might end up experiencing no
apparent consequences resulting from the incorrect installation.

Correction of this issue means removing the road wheel and the caliper,
switching the inner pads to their correct sides, then putting everything
back together again. It is not necessary to replace the pads unless they
are too far worn to keep in service.

From the dealership's perspective (and that of the state's inspection
agency), they did exactly what the law told them they had to do.

However, your independent garage unfortunately does not appear to
understand brake function as well as they should, and thus did a poor
inspection.


--
Tegger

The Unofficial Honda/Acura FAQ
www.tegger.com/hondafaq/

Tegger wrote:
Thanks for the reply. Calling wear indicators "sensors" is
ridiculous, and lying about the screwup with the oil change doesn't give
me any confidence that they are telling the truth about the brakes. At
any rate, given the rate with which I wear down brakes, this won't be an
issue for me, because I will know, year to year at inspection time, how
much pad I have left. The car will probably still have those pads on it
when I sell it. I'll be sure to mention the issue to the next owner.