Sqeak squeak squeak.

[BillDCat]

My car has started squeaking. Its a loud squeak squeak squeak that is happening ALL THE TIME, and gets faster as the car goes faster. I think it's coming from the rear. When I brake, or when I hit a big bump, the squeak goes away for a second. I had my car in a shop and had them look at the brakes. They said they brakes looked okay, and that it was normal brake noise. I know that this is definitely NOT normal brake noise. I put on new pads and had the rotors turned 6 months ago and had no problems except the occasional squeal when braking. The pads have plenty of life left and the rotors are still true.

I'm thinking along the lines of brake caliper/wheel bearing/rear differential. How do I test the calipers and wheel bearings? Thanks in advance.

 

[xcelr8n]

well, did you use good pads?
or the bargain basement ones that they warn you about.

on a side not my car also did this as well, louder as i went faster, and went away fi I braked.
My problem was that the crappy dust shield behind the rotor was scrapping and touching the back side of the rotor. Check it out.

 

[BillDCat]

The pads are not excellent or anything, just some Raybestos Quietstop ones I bought from Kragen/Checker (not the $15 a pair ones). Just checked the dust shields - no, they're not catching or scraping.

 

[realhp=turbo]

I tore my dust shields completly off. When the brakes where done did the pads get chamfered on both ends? Cause the "usual brake squeel" is brake dust collecting at the edge of the pad. If the pads are chamfered then the dust rolls under with no noise.

 

[BillDCat]

I was driving home tonite, and the problem just got worse. The squeak squeak is still there, but now the brakes squeal like mad when I brake. IN ADDITION, theres now a rythmic scraping sound coming from what sounds like the driver's front tire. It sounds like tire rubbing metal, but I couldn't really see anything immediately at night. I'm going to get the car up on jackstands in the morning to investigate...

Here's some questions:
1) Besides getting brake dust everywhere, what else will happen if I remove the shields?
2) How do I tell if I have a bad wheel bearing?
3) How do I tell if my brake caliper is dying?
4) What are some good "standard pads" for this car? I use mine as a fun-to-drive commuter-beater and thus don't need crazy good ceramic pads.

Thanks again in advance.

 

[realhp=turbo]

Tearing off the brake dust shields doesnt hurt anything. It does allow more water to have access to the rotor. The only time that can hurt you is if you go through a massive puddle and then try to stop immiediatly fast. I looks better and cools faster (IMO)
The wheel bearing Im going through right now and from what youve said so far this is not your problem. A bad wheel bearing makes a grinding feel. It howls like you have an off road tire on one side as you go down the road.
The only way that you can tell if your caliper is dying is to take it apart. If the rubber boot around the caliper is cracked or destroyed in any way then yes your caliper is toast. But not completely. You can go buy a caliper re-build kit and tear it all apart yourself. The critical thing with calipers is the slide points. Make sure they are properly lubed with some sil-glide or equivalant.
Good standard pads are the NAPA gold series. Every MIDAS in the land uses NAPA parts and this is what they buy. Ive walked in to NAPA and picked them up for like 12 to 15 bucks for the front set.
I hope that helps you a bit. I know the squeaking is very annoying. Mine does this too. But I attribute that to rear brakes that I havent dug into yet. They are not camfered, and the rear right rotor is slightly warped. That in combination with the amount of rain that we get around here equals squeak, squeak...

 

[dont need 8]

I had a brake caliper on another car that went bad, biggest tell tale sign was an abundance of brake dust on that one wheel.

 

[BillDCat]

I left the car in the garage since that night until I got a chance to check it out. I get it up on stands. I think I found the cause of the scraping sound... the left INNER CV joint boot had split, throwing grease everywhere. This pissed me off, as I had just rebuilt the OUTSIDE CV joint on that axle 3 months ago. I went to NAPA and bought the rebuild kit, with new boot. After 3 hours of swearing and a huge mess of grease, I determined that they had sold me the wrong kit... I returned the grease covered kit, and just ordered an entire rebuilt half shaft from Autozone (man, I was just pissed off and frustrated). Well, that should take care of the scraping.

As far as the squeaking... I got under the rear diff, and it seems to have developed a leak, i.e. it was not completely full of fluid as I had left it 6 months ago. I then remembered the sound that my old A4 Quattro made when one of it's diff seals had leaked... and it sounded just like my car now. It's got to have been a really slow leak, as I have not noticed ANY oil spots on my driveway. So I've got to fix that now.

AND then to the rear brakes. I took off what I suspected was the culprit caliper... the rear left. The seals looked okay. BUT the outer pad was quite a bit more worn than the inner pad, and BOTH were more worn than the right side. So I ordered a caliper rebuild kit.

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. It'll take me a few days to get parts in and to fix these things. I'm going to tear off the dust shields and get some NAPA gold pads as reccomended. THEN HOPEFULLY I can go back to just hearing the ever present sound of my lifters ticking AND NOTHING ELSE.

 

[realhp=turbo]

Dont forget to chamfer both ends of all the pads! You'll not hear that very irritating sound of brake dust.

 

[BillDCat]

I know what a chamfer is, but how should I go about chamfering my pads? Just use some sandpaper and round off the leading edge? It's not like I have a vertical mill in my garage.

 

[realhp=turbo]

<<<Smiles nu guys. JK Do you have a bench top grinder? take each pad and grind off on both ends at a 45 degree angle. All the way down to just before the grider wheel touches the metal backing. so that the dust always rolls under the pad till the end of its life. Any questions?

 

[BillDCat]

It's funny. Words such as 'chamfer' always put my mind in terms of machining processes, i.e. I would never have thought of using my bench grinder for that. I guess grinding down the edge will reduce the contact area of the pad a bit, but not by much to matter a whole lot.

Fixed that leak, still waiting on that damned halfshaft.

 

[eitan]

I had some pretty bad squeal coming from the brakes that were on my car when I bought it, so I just brought it in for a front brake job. $481.97 later, I've got new front rotors and pads, and brakes that don't fade after 2 stops from 55MPH! (The front rotors were cut more than once, and there was VERY little material left. A few stops from 130+ and they were gone.)