I just bought an 07 Grand Touring with the Brembo brakes. The car has 12,300 miles on it and the brakes squeal when I initially depress them but if I ease off them and press down again they don't squeal. Any ideas?

 

mine do the same thing. i figured it was a small particle(s) causing the problem

 

Could be the pad material. I'm not sure if the Brembo system comes with 'high performance' pads or something, but on my previous car I swapped in some Hawk HPS pads with my OEM brakes and they would squeal a bit the first time I got on the brakes (i.e. when they were cold), but as soon as the brakes were heated up the sound went away. Are you guys noticing that the brakes have less grab the first time you use them, and more grab on the subsequent use? Could be thermal affects.

 

Any brake setup can be made to squeal. As Sry posted pad material has everything to do with it. Metallic pads generally make more noise than non metallic pads. But you must not ignore the "GENERALLY" as its not always the case.

There are things that can be put on the pad surface (ie:BG brake quiet) which you put a thin layer on the brake pad surface and let it soak in. do it a cpl times. It will stop the noise for a few hundred-thousand miles (depending on brake compound and driver.)

 

The Z factory service manual advises the use of high temperature brake grease in an area where the pad shims contact the caliper pistons and on the edges where the pads contact the ss guides within the calipers. The grease will cost only a few dollars and is worth a try. A film of grease might eliminate dry metal-to-metal contact of pads within the calipers and mitigate squeal.

 

Not the issue..but yes good to have. prevents everything from welding themselves to one another.

 

Not really. The squeal you hear is actually high frequency vibrations from the pad "ears" rubbing back/forth in the sliders they ride in. The brake grease prevents that. It's not an issue of pad material IMHO

 

Material. Hawk pads trade low dust and decent higher temp brake performance for cold weather brake stop times. Unfortunately, a cold 1st brake stop if often when you need the BEST 60-0 performance.

 

heh you're tellin me. First stop attempt on a few consecutive mornings scared the crap outta me - thought I was going to have to steer off the road to avoid barrelling into an intersection. Then I learned to do one or two moderately hard (heavy pressure, but not abrupt) stops within my neighborhood on the way out, so that I would have some actual stopping force out on the public road.

Back on topic though, the OP didn't mention whether or not his pads are the ones that came with the car, or aftermarket. If they came with the car then I would think that the pads should be properly greased and silent

EDIT: He bought the car used, so maybe the previous owner swapped the pads. Sounds like it's time to take apart those calipers!

 

well that's your opinion, but your wrong.

well let me clarify, yes brake grease is a necessity, but if it was applied when the pads were installed then it would still be there. It has a way of hanging around.

Now the compound, being a semi-metallic will cause high pitched squeal. if light pressure is applied.

I can make ANY brakes squeal, and ANY brakes not. lube the crap out of em, I'll bet you $1 that I can make them squeal.

We both over simplified thigs, in reality both things can make a squeal, but based on his complaints I'm betting its the combo of pad material and driver technique.

 

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