That's less faff required then! Rears are only required at the minute so not having to remove the carrier will help save a bit of time. 

I had to replace my rear discs at 20k miles - pretty poor! I now have another 40k miles on the replacement Delphi discs and pads, they still look pretty good. I seem to recall it was about £120 for pads and discs (fitted by me). So problems with early demise of rear brake discs is nothing to do with braking etc, it is simply because the original equipment is utterly crap.

 

I had to remove the calliper carriers on mine, but it is the 280tsi with ventilated rear discs.

Edited 24 February, 20215 yr by nicknorman

bought Eicher Premium Brake Pad and pads from eurocarparts - cost £53.61, fitting kit from same for £4.67. chose their fitting option that uses local garage and paid them £59.90. Total cost £118.18. parts delivered to garage by eurocarparts except for fitting kit that i gave them when I dropped car off. must say delivery and fitting brilliant and recommend this compared to main dealer. This in Exeter and after dealer quoted £350.  

I just had my rear discs and pads done.

Purchased Brembo vented discs and pads from GSF during their st Patrick’s day sale for £131 delivered and was planning to do them myself as I have VCDS but got spooked when I had a look and discovered I didn’t have the correct 7mm socket to remove the callipers plus was unsure if the carriers also had to come off for the discs.

In the end I had my trusted local independent fit them for me, £48 for the labour and he confirmed the carriers did not have to come off (so that’s on a 280 4x4 with vented 310mm discs) and the job went smoothly while I went for a cycle ride!

Braking is all good and no issues, next time I’d be happy to do them myself now I have the 7mm short and long sockets, hopefully it’ll be another 3 years before they’re due though....

The fronts will be next but they have plenty of meat left on them so I guess the adaptive cruise is what’s seeing off the rears quicker.

Sorry, I know this is an older thread, but reading through it I got that for the SS MK3:

 

- you don't need to remove the carrier to remove solid rear discs

- you do need to remove the carrier to remove the front discs

Is this right?

 

What type of bolts are holding the front carriers? I saw some video where they were M-type (M-14, I think?). Can anyone confirm? My disks and pads are still half good but I need to have my discs resurfaced after a workshop torqued my lug nuts quite wrong and I started getting judder when braking... Was thinking of keeping pads, otherwise I need to wind back the electric brakes and whatnot... needs tool I currently don't have, so I'd rather not...

You are right about the carriers. The front carrier bolts have the normal hexagonal heads on mine, can't remember the size but it was in my 1/2" socket set. They are torqued to 200Nm and awkward to access but it can be done, unclipping a section of the undertray helped me gain an extra bit of space for the torque wrench.

Cool, thanks! Another small thing though: since I'll be removing them in my garage, I have to do them one by one and don't have an easy/safe way to keep both rear (or front) wheels up simultaneously. Is it possible/OK to mount back the wheel without the discs, just to be able to set the car down again, or is this a no-no (or there is no clearance to the carriers?)?

You can do it one wheel at a time. Make sure the corner you are working on is securely supported though, you will have to work underneath the car to do the carrier bolts.

Ok, thanks. But the thing is, I'm not replacing them, I'm having them machined since they're still quite new and, ideally, I suppose I should take the pair to the workshop. But that means either having to sit the car on stands (I have them, but I'm weary of doing it because it seems hard to lift the car AND support it in the correct location to remove the jack), or put the wheels back just to be able to put the car down

@pcspinheiroDid you price up a new pair of discs compared to having the OEM ones skimmed?

I used to get good or expensive discs skimmed but with VW Group stuff i would not bother. 

Now I understand the problem! Disc skimming in the UK would cost more than new discs I think.

 

Since you have stands I would recommend using them. I put mine in the location suggested by @JR RS that will not get in the way of your jack:

Edited 12 May, 20224 yr by D402

More than a little late to the party but thank you for the info contained within this thread. My Skoda dealer (Startin Skoda in Worcester) wanted £665 for new front pads, rear pads and rear disks on my 280. Happy with 75,000 miles out of those, not happy with that price. I picked up Pagid pads and Brembo 310mm vented rear disks (would have got Pagid but they were OOS) for about £170 from carparts4less. Incidentally, they were £40 cheaper than ECP, despite being the exact same company and even delivered in a ECP van!

 

Naturally an easy job just became a ballache when I realised I needed to disengage the electronic handbrake. Fortunately this thread pointed me in the direction of Carista which have a 7 day free trial when you sign up for the 12 month sub, which you can immediately cancel and so get the app to do what you need for nowt, and I already had a blutooth ODB dongle. Next I just needed to put the car on charge as advised...only my charger despite having been used extensively with no issues decides that today, the time I need it, it is fully dead. F. M. L. Oh and of course I'm doing this in the glorious sunshine and on a gravel driveway for more funs.

 

Just wanted to reply and say that I was able to replace the rear 310mm vented disks without dismantling the entire car. Only 1x T45 caliper pin (hidden under a dust cap) needed to be undone to flip the caliper up and out of the way to do the pads, and the disk has juuuuust enough room to slide on and off without having to remove the carrier. I will note that the disk required substantial persuasion in order to budge in the first place though.

2 hours ago, DBT85 said:

the disk has juuuuust enough room to slide on and off without having to remove the carrier. I will note that the disk required substantial persuasion in order to budge in the first place though.

When the disc slides out with literally a thou of space either side its a beautiful feeling. Normally they are slightly rusty and require a bit of persuasion just to break the rust free.

On 12/05/2022 at 16:34, roottoot said:

@pcspinheiroDid you price up a new pair of discs compared to having the OEM ones skimmed?

I used to get good or expensive discs skimmed but with VW Group stuff i would not bother. 

I did and it was about 3-4x the price of having them machined (for discs from known brands, there were cheaper aftermarkets). I only paid 10€/disc to have them machined, plus they had very little wear since I do a defensive driving and use the brakes sparingly. On top of that, I got the discs back the same day, whereas the prices I mention were on-line with 1-2 weeks delivery (auto-doc). I did not price them locally but suspect they would be a heavy bit more from known brands. 

 

17 hours ago, ApertureS said:

When the disc slides out with literally a thou of space either side its a beautiful feeling. Normally they are slightly rusty and require a bit of persuasion just to break the rust free.

That's the beauty of southern countries. We don't use road salt and those exposed metal bits are usually in very good condition. Some surface rust is expected, but I've never seen rusted callipers, or discs that look rotten to the core, like some I've seen in pictures here and elsewhere. A good pressure wash and some brush work to remove brake dust and you get shiny callipers again.

Edited 17 June, 20223 yr by pcspinheiro

I have a mates rate mechanic / auto gearbox specialist but even then it costs me more than that when paying for time taken.

After reading this topic I have decided to change my rear discs and pads myself. Quotation received from the dealer (Pullman Skoda Durham) was in my view excessively high - £369. They didn’t even offer an option of fitting better quality items neither would accept me supplying what I would want. I have purchased set of Brembo discs and pads for just over £100 and installed it in approx 90 minutes. I have an OBD 11 however I’m not really sure I needed to use it. I had do wind down pistons regardless. What bothers me is an appalling quality of the originally installed items. 1st service 12k miles advised to change, 2nd definitely required at 24k. I must admit the discs and pads were in crazy bad state. May post photo later on. 

Wow, advised to change discs and pads at 12k miles??? Mine is 70k km and I just had all 4 resurfaced since they had almost no visible wear. I too was advised to change them since they said the discs and pads were too worn, but my inspection showed pads with 2/3+ of the material and discs with a barely noticeable lip from wear. I think driving style and road type is more important that the quality of these things in terms of wear. I do a relaxed and defensive driving and I suppose I reach for the brakes a lot less than the average person. I had them machined since I started to get some brake shimmer (likely due to badly torqued wheels), but it I reckon they would otherwise last me 100k+ km without touching them. 

Edited 23 June, 20223 yr by pcspinheiro

39 minutes ago, pcspinheiro said:

Wow, advised to change discs and pads at 12k miles??? Mine is 70k km and I just had all 4 resurfaced since they had almost no visible wear. I too was advised to change them since they said the discs and pads were too worn, but my inspection showed pads with 2/3+ of the material and discs with s barely noticeable lip from wear. I think driving style and road type is more important that the quality of these things in terms of wear. I do a relaxed and defensive driving and I suppose I reach for the brakes a lot less than the average person. I had them machined since I started to get some brake shimmer (likely due to badly torqued wheels), by it I reckon they would otherwise last me 100k+ km without touching them. 

It is poor quality rather than anything else. Believe me I’m very conservative driver. In previous car ( Mondeo) front pads lasted 96k miles, rear never changed until sold at 126k. In this one the thickness of pads and discs was ok but either of them was badly corroded and grooved. Still got discs waiting to chuck away, will take photo later on to show how poor they are.

Disc from the Superb 2.0tdi after 24k miles from new 95% motorway BUT with regular use of ACC

Wow, those look like scrapyard finds... Here in Portugal we never use road salt and these parts usually only get some surface rust. But what is striking is the way those wore, with such deep scratches and areas of no apparent contact.  

 

These are my rear factory-fitted pads after 70k km (the discs are out of focus but you can see they are in good nick):

 

And the discs after resurfacing:

 

Edited 23 June, 20223 yr by pcspinheiro

6 hours ago, greg_aniol said:

Disc from the Superb 2.0tdi after 24k miles from new 95% motorway BUT with regular use of ACC

My 280 is at 75k miles and now only just 5 years old in September, the vast majority was on the motorway with ACC on. The discs looked fine apart from 2 rings that for some reason were not wearing at the same rate, with commensurate marks in the pads. Yours look like they've used some pre chewed toffee for the discs.

Yes, the quality is below any acceptable level. Moreover the attitude of service personnel stinks even more. Two dealerships 2x poor customer service. Many think that “free coffee “ which you paid for within overpriced service charge covers what matters. Unfortunately not. Never mind. 

I don't get free coffee here in Portugal, but I do get a "free" car wash. I agree that I would rather have no amenities and, instead, have people that actually listen to my complaints and do their best to find the problems. I'm not a complete idiot when it comes to cars but this is how I'm treated when I go to the dealership. I've been complaining from suspension Boise from the right side but they can't find anything. On another situation it's come to the ridiculous of me showing a video with the cabin ventilation making a loud chirping noise (every colder winter morning!), left the car overnight in the winter and next morning they say they couldn't hear it... It's just frustrating...

On 23/06/2022 at 17:02, DBT85 said:

My 280 is at 75k miles and now only just 5 years old in September, the vast majority was on the motorway with ACC on. The discs looked fine apart from 2 rings that for some reason were not wearing at the same rate, with commensurate marks in the pads. Yours look like they've used some pre chewed toffee for the discs.

My 280 is at 77k and nearly 5 years old. Again the vast majority must have been with ACC prior to my purchase at 67k, 12 months ago as it is still on the original discs according to the full print out service history. The front discs look fine with a bit of a lip, but the rear discs have  rust around the hub. I'm hoping it will go through the MOT fine next week as my last car (VW Passat B8) failed the mot on front discs at 60k and then rear discs at 70k but it was manual and did not have ACC.

Edited 25 June, 20223 yr by the_wiley
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