How long does disc brake pads last?

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TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

darrydonds wrote:
Tue May 31, 2022 8:08 pm

I wonder how much riding style makes a difference, say between a rider who tends to brake late and hard and a rider who relies more on anticipation to coast and apply the brakes gradually.

A lot. Assume both riders are simply coasting down a mountain. The rider who brakes later, harder and finishes first went faster. Faster = more KE. The rider who went slower by dragging the brakes converted more PE into heat / frictional losses rather than KE / speed.

There are minor details here like temperature / heating trends in the components, but even that favors the faster descender, especially air volume moving past the components is reduced.

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froze
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by froze

warthog101 wrote:
Tue May 31, 2022 2:35 pm
Image

My commute prior to discs.

I'll take discs please. They actually work when it's wet too.

Not at all concerned about pad and disc wear.
That rim brake looks like it has been poorly taken care of. With rim brakes if you use Kool Stop Salmon pads they work very good in the rain and they last a very long time. I use to tour and do bike camping on an old 85 Schwinn Le Tour Luxe with Cantilever rim brakes, and Kool Stop Salmon pads, and with a loaded bike in the rain I never had any issue stopping, and neither have thousands of other tourists and campers over the last 75 years had problems.

warthog101
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by warthog101

froze wrote:
warthog101 wrote:
Tue May 31, 2022 2:35 pm
Image

My commute prior to discs.

I'll take discs please. They actually work when it's wet too.

Not at all concerned about pad and disc wear.
That rim brake looks like it has been poorly taken care of. With rim brakes if you use Kool Stop Salmon pads they work very good in the rain and they last a very long time. I use to tour and do bike camping on an old 85 Schwinn Le Tour Luxe with Cantilever rim brakes, and Kool Stop Salmon pads, and with a loaded bike in the rain I never had any issue stopping, and neither have thousands of other tourists and campers over the last 75 years had problems.
I have thousands of ks on road bikes and plenty in the rain.
Nowhere near as much using discs. It is immediately evident however, that discs are vastly superior in wet weather. They sometimes make a bit of noise.
Meh, I'll take that over the grinding sound that went with the photo I posted.
Those Zondas simply ground as the result of sand and grit sticking to the wet rim and being compressed by the brake pad.
Soon starts shredding the rim.
Tried multiple different pads. All suck in the wet compared to discs.

TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

froze wrote:
Wed Jun 01, 2022 4:08 am

That rim brake looks like it has been poorly taken care of. With rim brakes if you use Kool Stop Salmon pads they work very good in the rain and they last a very long time. I use to tour and do bike camping on an old 85 Schwinn Le Tour Luxe with Cantilever rim brakes, and Kool Stop Salmon pads, and with a loaded bike in the rain I never had any issue stopping, and neither have thousands of other tourists and campers over the last 75 years had problems.

Take two immaculately maintained bikes and ride them in the rain/mud/whatever. The braketrack being that much closer to sources of contamination is a clear disadvantage in this specific situation.

MikeD
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by MikeD

TobinHatesYou wrote:
darrydonds wrote:
Tue May 31, 2022 8:08 pm

I wonder how much riding style makes a difference, say between a rider who tends to brake late and hard and a rider who relies more on anticipation to coast and apply the brakes gradually.

A lot. Assume both riders are simply coasting down a mountain. The rider who brakes later, harder and finishes first went faster. Faster = more KE. The rider who went slower by dragging the brakes converted more PE into heat / frictional losses rather than KE / speed.

There are minor details here like temperature / heating trends in the components, but even that favors the faster descender, especially air volume moving past the components is reduced.
Body weight and pad material enter into this in a big way as well. Resin pads wear out much faster than metallic pads.

darrydonds
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by darrydonds

TobinHatesYou wrote:
Wed Jun 01, 2022 1:14 am
A lot. Assume both riders are simply coasting down a mountain. The rider who brakes later, harder and finishes first went faster. Faster = more KE. The rider who went slower by dragging the brakes converted more PE into heat / frictional losses rather than KE / speed.

There are minor details here like temperature / heating trends in the components, but even that favors the faster descender, especially air volume moving past the components is reduced.
But faster doesn't necessarily mean more economical on the brakes. Two cars rolling towards a red-light: the one that reaches that intersection faster will have to brake harder. Two riders on a descent: the one who coast at the bottom and let friction do its work will be less demanding on his brakes than the other who looks to keep his speed and brake at the last second.

TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

darrydonds wrote:
Fri Jun 03, 2022 8:57 pm

But faster doesn't necessarily mean more economical on the brakes. Two cars rolling towards a red-light: the one that reaches that intersection faster will have to brake harder. Two riders on a descent: the one who coast at the bottom and let friction do its work will be less demanding on his brakes than the other who looks to keep his speed and brake at the last second.
What you said makes no sense in an all-else-being-equal comparison where the only difference is braking. The rider who gets to the light faster will have braked less…period. The faster rider even has to deal with aero drag scaling as a square while the slower rider is less affected by aero drag.

The only way your scenario can occur is if another unmentioned variable is added…the rider traveling faster is more aero, heavier, not coasting, has lower Crr tires, etc.

MikeD
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by MikeD

I just got 2500 miles out of Shimano L03A pads. I think that's piss poor mileage. I tried the Swiss Stop Exotherm2 pads and they fit too tightly (too thick) that they rubbed the rotor. They also have too much slop in the longitudinal direction and the cooling fins are too wide and they interfere with the Allen key needed to tighten the mounting bolts. Not an acceptable substitute IMO from a fit standpoint.

froze
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by froze

MikeD wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 8:33 pm
I just got 2500 miles out of Shimano L03A pads. I think that's piss poor mileage. I tried the Swiss Stop Exotherm2 pads and they fit too tightly (too thick) that they rubbed the rotor. They also have too much slop in the longitudinal direction and the cooling fins are too wide and they interfere with the Allen key needed to tighten the mounting bolts. Not an acceptable substitute IMO from a fit standpoint.
I don't own Shimano disk brakes but according to the internet the life expectancy they're getting out of Shimano pads is between 100 miles and 1,250 miles according to Road Bike Review, if that is true then you got double the life expectancy. Either way, that's why I don't like disk brakes, but when I bought my touring bike I didn't have a choice. Rim pads lasted 10 times longer 1,250 miles!

Another website said this: "500-700 miles out of resin disc brake pads and 1,000-1,250 miles out of sintered metal disc brake pads."

Here is a discussion on another forum about pad wear: https://bicycles.stackexchange.com/ques ... -pads-last

I have TRP mechanical disk brakes on my touring bike but that one has low miles on the bike, about 1,000 miles maybe 1,200 miles but so far the brake pads are good despite most of those miles being loaded miles, but I'm not braking a lot either.

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Juanmoretime
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by Juanmoretime

7300 miles on a SRAM Force calipers and still not done. Might toss my back up pads on the end of this season.
Last edited by Juanmoretime on Tue Aug 02, 2022 2:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

froze wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 11:19 pm
MikeD wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 8:33 pm
I just got 2500 miles out of Shimano L03A pads. I think that's piss poor mileage. I tried the Swiss Stop Exotherm2 pads and they fit too tightly (too thick) that they rubbed the rotor. They also have too much slop in the longitudinal direction and the cooling fins are too wide and they interfere with the Allen key needed to tighten the mounting bolts. Not an acceptable substitute IMO from a fit standpoint.
I don't own Shimano disk brakes but according to the internet the life expectancy they're getting out of Shimano pads is between 100 miles and 1,250 miles according to Road Bike Review, if that is true then you got double the life expectancy. Either way, that's why I don't like disk brakes, but when I bought my touring bike I didn't have a choice. Rim pads lasted 10 times longer 1,250 miles!

Another website said this: "500-700 miles out of resin disc brake pads and 1,000-1,250 miles out of sintered metal disc brake pads."

Here is a discussion on another forum about pad wear: https://bicycles.stackexchange.com/ques ... -pads-last

I have TRP mechanical disk brakes on my touring bike but that one has low miles on the bike, about 1,000 miles maybe 1,200 miles but so far the brake pads are good despite most of those miles being loaded miles, but I'm not braking a lot either.

Because those numbers are based on the worst case off-road / MTB applications. As it turns out, road is a lot less stressful on braking components than MTB (don't tell Peak Torque!)

I have >7000mi as well on my SwissStop "E" compound pads.

froze
Posts: 430
Joined: Thu Aug 05, 2010 3:47 am

by froze

TobinHatesYou wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 11:52 pm
froze wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 11:19 pm
MikeD wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 8:33 pm
I just got 2500 miles out of Shimano L03A pads. I think that's piss poor mileage. I tried the Swiss Stop Exotherm2 pads and they fit too tightly (too thick) that they rubbed the rotor. They also have too much slop in the longitudinal direction and the cooling fins are too wide and they interfere with the Allen key needed to tighten the mounting bolts. Not an acceptable substitute IMO from a fit standpoint.
I don't own Shimano disk brakes but according to the internet the life expectancy they're getting out of Shimano pads is between 100 miles and 1,250 miles according to Road Bike Review, if that is true then you got double the life expectancy. Either way, that's why I don't like disk brakes, but when I bought my touring bike I didn't have a choice. Rim pads lasted 10 times longer 1,250 miles!

Another website said this: "500-700 miles out of resin disc brake pads and 1,000-1,250 miles out of sintered metal disc brake pads."

Here is a discussion on another forum about pad wear: https://bicycles.stackexchange.com/ques ... -pads-last

I have TRP mechanical disk brakes on my touring bike but that one has low miles on the bike, about 1,000 miles maybe 1,200 miles but so far the brake pads are good despite most of those miles being loaded miles, but I'm not braking a lot either.

Because those numbers are based on the worst case off-road / MTB applications. As it turns out, road is a lot less stressful on braking components than MTB (don't tell Peak Torque!)

I have >7000mi as well on my SwissStop "E" compound pads.
But the Road Bike Review report was about road bikes not about MTB's

TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

froze wrote:
Tue Aug 02, 2022 3:39 am

But the Road Bike Review report was about road bikes not about MTB's

Anyone getting 1250mi or lower out of sintered brake pads in dryish conditions needs to learn how to ride a bike.

warthog101
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by warthog101

^^Agreed.

5500km on my gravelly with resin Shimano pads.
Plenty of life left yet.

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mrlobber
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by mrlobber

The pad wear (and not only that) has a lot to do with rider weight also.

I wore out a set of AMP organic pads I tried out for curiosity in a week in Alps/Dolomites (around 15k of ascent/descent), and I was 78kg this summer, so totally not comparable with Tobins flyweight "frame", for instance. However, on my (mostly city) commuter bike, which naturally involves a lot of braking on red lights etc, I'm at 9000km and still going for the Shimano original pad set which came with the brakes.
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