Fabia 1.6 auto 2009 with very low mileage and it only does about 3000 miles per year, it's kept in a garage and only usually driven on dry days so the brakes aren't subject to the effects of rain. The brake response is quite severe and it's difficult to apply the brakes gently without concentration because they seem to grab, is this simply a case of changing the brake pads or is it something more complicated?

When was any servicing and maintenance carried out, brakes stripped, pins greased, brake fluid changed, even the brake pads inspected?

I take it it passes MOT's so someone brake tests it, and has a good look at the discs and pads.

Fabia and severe brakes aren't things you normally see in the same sentence. My wife used to have a Nissan Sunny, that had great brakes. Damn thing could stop on command.

 

Given mileage, then it probably needs a full brake strip down. Contrary to what people think, a car running short distances is likely to be problematic. Probably seized brake sliders. 

 

If its siezed, then run the car for say 10 miles and coast to a stop without braking. If the rotors are hot, there's your problem. Don't touch them with you finger, hold your hand against the alloy.

Thanks for the replies, it was at the garage earlier this year for the brakes to be looked at and they thought it might just need a good run to unglaze the pads, it always passes the MOT without any trouble. Perhaps I'll just book it in again and get new pads fitted

Maybe someplace where they actually do give the brakes a service and preventative maintenance.

 

Did they just 'Look at the brakes' not actually do anything, and did they charge extra money for that or was it part of the Inspection Service'?

http://skoda.co.uk/finance-and-offers/service-and-maintenance/simply-fixed 

Lots of looking and not much actually doing anything.

 

Maybe no new pads needed just a Brake Service / strip clean, grease, reassemble, and then again maybe pads are needed, but because needed not because brakes not serviced,

i can deglaze pads off the car very easily, with what used to be known as sand paper or emery cloth. Now there are scrubbing pads.

I would be tempted to take it for a reasonable length drive being harder on the brakes than I was normally to see if that  eased them up at all.

I agree with Spartacus. The pads are glazed because the caliper and pistons are not sliding freely. So the pads are in constant contact, overheating and glazing over making them very sharp.

 

Needs stripping down, cleaning and any corrosion on sliding bits fettled. Pads can be deglazed with some grit paper although they've probably been thoroughly cooked, so may not be great even deglazed. It's cheap enough to put a new set on.

 

Finally after reassembly and proper application of brake grease on sliding bits, check the brakes release, the piston pushes back easily and the calipers slide well.

I would be delighted if over-servo'd powerful brakes was a general problem on the Fabia like it was on the Fiesta ST, 

I had the brakes cleaned and a new set of pads fitted, the old ones were less than 1/4 worn. Unfortunately the brakes are as sensitive as they were before so it must be something like a servo issue, the garage is none the wiser.

What has been done to the rear?

@montecarlo

Have you had the car from new and know that the brakes were never reset to have more Brake Assist as some cars might get if the driver requested this.

ie Motability lease car 10 years ago & never reset to Factory Mode at the end of lease.

 

?

Has the car had a brake fluid change recently or any time in the past 10 years?

Passing the MOT is not really an issue as they do that on a roller so the over sharpness will not really be a problem. They may not even notice at all! Did the MOT guy mention the sharpness as they drove it in or out though? Did the garage do likewise or are they going by your description? 

I ask as I had a student who thought my brakes were sharp, after having previous lessons in a brand new Ford Focus, whilst my car was around 6 years old. It is really a subjective issue unless they really are as you describe, quite severe. 

I too, would have thought the brakes are not retracting properly so when you re-apply, any pressure is like n emergency stop.

You say you had the brakes cleaned but if you mean you sprayed them with brake cleaner or popped the pads out, wire brushed them and re-fitted them, this will not be enough.

You will almost certainly need to remove the pads, carefully pump out the caliber pistons and clean the sides and surface of the pistons, lubing and gently pressing them back in to the callipers, along with cleaning/lubing the sliders and pins, etc. 

Note the word carefully, you won't want to pump the pistons out too far as they will fall out and then the whole system will need a re-bleed. 

You may well be best to do this anyway though but properly, via the bleed nipples, rather then by accidentally pressing out the pistons. Fresh fluid is a good start as it may be contaminated. 

The brake fluid has been completely renewed not long ago and the brake calipers were cleaned and lubricated when the new pads were fitted, the pistons might not have been lubricated because I didn't request it. How can the brake assistance be adjusted and is it possible that it has adjusted itself? The rear brakes haven't been fitted with new pads as the problem is at the front, the garage confirmed this.

26 minutes ago, montecarlo said:

The rear brakes haven't been fitted with new pads as the problem is at the front, the garage confirmed this.

 

It has discs on the back?

Yes it’s got rear discs which are great. We have a Monte Carlo too which has drums at the rear, having rear discs makes a bigger difference to your braking efficiency than you might think and they look better too. I’m not sure why the MC doesn’t have discs but I have a suspicion that it was a cost cutting exercise and money is everything to VW! They pass the expense directly on to the the customer because our dealer would try to sell us a rear brake drum clean every so often, they never do that with the front discs. The brakes always worked better after the drum clean but it only lasted for a few weeks at the most, perhaps they only fit drums to make more profit for the dealers.

Just now, montecarlo said:

Yes it’s got rear discs which are great. We have a Monte Carlo too which has drums at the rear, having rear discs makes a bigger difference to your braking efficiency than you might think and they look better too. I’m not sure why the MC doesn’t have discs but I have a suspicion that it was a cost cutting exercise and money is everything to VW! They pass the expense directly on to the the customer because our dealer would try to sell us a rear brake drum clean every so often, they never do that with the front discs. The brakes always worked better after the drum clean but it only lasted for a few weeks at the most, perhaps they only fit drums to make more profit for the dealers.

 

Not sure it's even down to cost cutting to be honest, i'm sure there isn't actually that much difference between the two. Not real need to clean front discs and pads up unlike the rear drums where the dust and debris has no where to go.

@montecarlo

The Brake Assist could have adjusted at a dealership or by someone plugging in and changing the setting for assist.

'Disability setting'.  

?

So have you had the car from new?

 

You have a 2009 car, at that time the Skoda Service Menu showed remove wheels and clean brakes as part of the Major Service when they were calling them 

Minor / Inspection Service, and Major service as in Year about.

 

You have rear Discs, with your car and a Tiptronic box that had no Manufacturers Recommendations / Schedule for servicing / Oil changes in 2009.

Edited 11 June, 20197 yr by Skoffski

I asked at the dealers once but no one seemed to know why, I couldn’t really think of another logical explanation, I think if you got out of a car with four discs and straight into a car with rear drums you’d be able to tell, but apart from all this, disc brakes first became common place in the 1960’s and were one of the biggest contributions to car safety, even bicycles have them today so why fit drums on a new £17000 car?

No we bought it secondhand from the main dealers and it was fine then, it stayed alright for 2 or 3 years and then it started doing this. It hasn’t been back to the main dealers for a while or plugged into anything like a diagnostic machine, just had the usual  annual services. MOT’s and routine maintenance when necessary.

Because that was all that was needed. Was it a £17,000 car?

 

A Fabia MK2 vRS with 180ps minimum and a DSG has rear discs, and crap they are.

 

There were Diesel Fabia with rear discs.

Things are what they are.  Personally i have no problems with rear drums with a DSG or Tiptronic as i use the gears to slow down not brakes very often and Skoda / VW Discs corrode as you look at them i some locations / environments.  Needing to use the brakes in the first mile to get rust off them.

Drums are fine (and arguably better for smaller and lighter cars) providing they are adjusted correctly and that is the trick. The self adjusters don't really work all that well so need regular cleaning and adjustment that obviously a caliper doesn't. That said most standard Fabia sized cars that have discs on the back suffer corrosion issues long before they are worn out purely because they don't do that much.

My wife's August 2015 VW Polo 1.2TSI 110 etc was bought new, and during the first winter, it did look like the rear discs would need replacing by its first MOT, but right now, even the inner face of the rear discs is still 90% shiny, which surprised me. I do agree that VW Group, well from my experience SEAT and VW small cars do tend to get fitted with discs that love to rust quicker than any aftermarket brand that I tend to fit.

 

Rear discs instead of drums, I'm surprised that there are some very small cheap "Eastern area(not Eastern Europe)" cars that get fitted with rear disc brakes - some of them you have to look very closely to see the discs they are so small! Probably cheaper for companies like Mando to supply these small kits to the factories.

I optioned ESP on my Greenie, when I purchased it back in 2009. This option then upgraded the rear brakes to discs at a fairly decent price. I have never had to replace the discs since then, despite buying a set of pads and discs some years ago, whilst doing the fronts. The rear pads were changed and will need changing again soon but the discs are still going strong and non rusty. I guess its the luck of the draw and the fact that they were optioned, meant the builder needed to supply non standard parts, such as rear axle set up, etc so may have been better quality then a standard production run. I have  covered around 140,000 miles in it, to date.

Hi mrgf, that explains something, I had a Fabia 1 before the Monte Carlo and it had discs all round and traction control, when we ordered the Monte Carlo I asked if it came with traction control and was told yes so I didn't need to add ESP, I added lots of other options so the extra £300 wasn't a big deal but I was told it didn't need it, when the car arrived it had rear drums and no traction control, if there was only one thing I could change on the car it would be this, it is a tsi so it's light at the front end and setting off where there's not much grip or accelerating in really bad weather can be a challenge which it wasn't in the last Fabia. To be fair to the salesman it should have been standard in this day and age anyway.

What power output is it?

 

i thought they all had ASR as standard