A few brake issues

[Marches]

My car has pretty much had issues with the brakes since I bought it in November, although it passed an MOT at the same time so mustn't have been anything up with it them. The handbrake sticks on the back brake (drums) when it's left for any amount of time parked up, especially over night. They unstick as you move off.

 

The other more interesting one is the front disc brakes. They do this awful dull whining, seems to be worse when cold and sounds a bit like metal rubbing on metal to me, I'll try to add a clip of the sound if I can some time. They've done this for a bit now, I've read on here about the factory fitted discs being crap and think I saw somewhere about replacing them for octavia ones too?

Then recently went on a trip to Scotland (so from near Manchester to southern Scotland and back). On the way there it was snowing heavily and at a roundabout came to brake and the wheels locked, brakes felt spongy and abs light came on. It seemed fine straight after got out of that and took it a car wash and blasted a load of grit off the discs.

The abs light has been on and off since then though. Went off over night, then went over a bump in the road and back on... The brakes haven't felt as responsive since either so somethings off with them.

I'm running it to the garage tomorrow but wondered what you guys think?

[Ootohere]

Welcome.

What Fabia do you have, and how old and how many miles done?

 

As to the hand brake / rear drums there are 3 threads in this last week on these pages.

 

Why would Octavia Discs (Bigger) be needed if you just serviced the ones you have?   If you want buy all the bits needed and fit them but not from an Octavia,

If it needs new Fabia discs, pads and a fluid change then that is what to get done.

[Marches]

1 minute ago, AwaoffSki said:

Welcome.

What Fabia do you have, and how old and how many miles done?

 

As to the hand brake / rear drums there are 3 threads in this last week on these pages.

 

Why would Octavia Discs (Bigger) be needed if you just serviced the ones you have?   If you want buy all the bits needed and fit them but not from an Octavia,

If it needs new Fabia discs, pads and a fluid change then that is what to get done.

 

Hi,

 

I have an 09 MkII Fabia that's done 62,000 miles.

 

OK I'll have a look at those drum threads.

 

The Octavia pads thing is something I've read elsewhere on here. I don't know cars that well yet (haven't been driving that long) so I have no idea, I'm still learning. I haven't had the front brakes serviced although had a garage look at the back drums a month ago which cured the sticking for a bit but it's returned now. The front brakes which is what I'm most concerned about haven't been looked at though, all I've done is literally blast the discs with the jet wash to get the grit and snow off them.

 

This is what I read on another thread about them, maybe I'm getting my wires crossed somewhere -

 

On 12/03/2017 at 12:24, James@Pentagon_Seat said:

This issue has been ongoing for some time now and usually affects fabia colour editions from a certain build period that use the 256mm, vented ATE FS III front brake setup, which has been used for over 20 years on VAG cars without any issues. 

For the first 6 months of this issue Skoda UK flat out denied that there was a problem with the pads. 

 

On every car we checked the pads had hot-spots on the pads and there was copious, visible amounts of brass-like metallic compound in them too. These hard spots are where the material can no longer wear onto the disc surface correctly and where the noise originates from. 

The pad material in question is very dark in colour with metallic flecks and they are manufactured by ATE in Italy.

 

At first we were advised to fit like for like parts which eventually resulted in the same problem, then I thought outside the box and matched some Octavia ECO pads that were a completely different compound, light in colour, they had chamfered edges and a slot cut down the middle to remove excess dust. With these fitted the cars no longer had the issue and that's what we did to a dozen or so fabias. It's also worth mentioning that these were made in India by a different company. We had no complaints after these were fitted.

 

Then some "suit" at the top decided that they were now going to admit liability and take some proactive action. Que the recall of any vehicle we had worked on for this issue.

 

Along came the "new" pads and a "bedding in" procedure (never had to do such a thing on any other set of standard pads and I must have fitted thousands of sets!?).

The work is carried out, everyone is happy apart from our aftersales manager because despite Skoda stipulating that we MUST carry out the bedding in procedure that takes about an hour - they don't want to pay us for it! 

 

3 weeks later and on the exact same day - 3 customers with the new pads call up to say they have started squeaking again. 

 

Back to the workshop > Indian pads fitted > problem solved. 

 

 

This is the thread here -

 

[Ootohere]

The brakes need servicing, stripping, greasing pins etc. 

Driving on salty roads and blasting brakes does nothing to improve brakes, just means that servicing and maintenance needs doing.

 

That is a Mk3 Fabia and squeeling in the posts you linked, 

but no matter what age of car, some copper slip on the rear of a brake pad, or anti rattle squeal shims and copper grease is common when servicing.

 

The other thread said Octavia Pads, your OP said Octavia Discs.

Edited 31 January, 2018 by AwaoffSki

[Marches]

8 minutes ago, AwaoffSki said:

The brakes need servicing, stripping, greasing pins etc. 

Driving on salty roads and blasting brakes does nothing to improve brakes, just means that servicing and maintenance needs doing.

 

That is a Mk3 Fabia and squeeling in the posts you linked, 

but no matter what age of car, some copper slip on the rear of a brake pad, or anti rattle squeal shims and copper grease is common when servicing.

 

The other thread said Octavia Pads, your OP said Octavia Discs.

 

The brakes have done the noise for a few months now but only had that incident in Scotland a few days ago but I suppose it was winter when I got the car so it's probably picked up a lot of grit by now.

 

Ah, sorry my mistake, I meant the pads.

 

Well it'll be going in the garage tomorrow with a bit of luck. Thought I was going to have to get the pads changed. Thanks for explaining it to me.

[xman]

If the front brakes have been making strange noises and especially metal on metal type sounds, you should immediately get them looked and repaired and not wait a few months.

 

Its more likely the dull whining is a failing wheel bearing, which explains the abs light, which in turn suggests its now totally disintegrating and is extremely dangerous.

 

Get it looked at straight away.

 

Let us all know what needed to be done to fix them

Edited 31 January, 2018 by xman