Skoda Kodiaq Rear Brake Pads and Disc Replacement

Hello Everyone.

I replaced the rear brake pads and disc on my 2018 Skoda Kodiaq 2.0 Tsi today and thought I'd share some insights. This car has the standard 300mm rear discs. The bake pads and discs were the originals, having covered 46,000 miles!!

First thing to say is that replacing the rear bake discs is a heck of a lot easier than replacing the front discs, the reason being that you don't need to remove the caliper carrier. This was great news to me because if you google the procedure or ask ChatGPT it will tell you that you do need to remove the carrier and you don't!!! This is great news because to remove the caliper carrier requires you to undo two very tight bolts which are quite hard to access, requires a specific XZN bit socket (extra cost), and requires new bolts to be installed (more cost). I think the confusion happens because for a lot of other VW group vehicles you probably do need to remove the caliper carriers to get the discs out, but thankfully for the Kodiaq you don't.

I found a video on youtube, in german, which shows the procedure. Thankfully I watched this before I started as it clearly shows the discs coming off without removing the caliper carrier. I couldn't find a english language video that shows the procedure on the Kodiaq. Here is the link: https://youtu.be/vdhvSYmhNgg?si=TDo4Q21_ueCNkaf7

The other complication is that this car has an electronic parking brake (EPB) fitted which you need to put into service mode before you can replace the rear pads/discs. I already had an OBD2 ELM327 Bluetooth reader so I downloaded Carista, paid for a month subscription (£19.99 which is a ripoff!), paired it up to my reader and used that to put the brake into service mode. You use need a cheap ELM327 reader (£10 on Amazon) and not an expensive Carista reader.

I wont repeat the procedure as the video does that very well.

Cost wise I spent: Two discs (£89.08 for both), Set of pads (£30.71), 1 month Carista subscription (£19.99). So £139.78 in total for parts.