The brake pad indicator came on this morning, and almost made me spew my coffee across the dash. I'm not going to the dealer to get this done, so I'm considering two options: a local Audi shop or doing it myself. Here are some questions:
Do I need any special tools to do it myself (something to open the calipers)? If so, how much do they cost?
If I go to a shop, what is a reasonable rate for replacing all four corners?
Does anyone have any recommendations as to what brand pad to use? I was considering Greenstuff...but if anyone has any good input let me know.
even though it is no different the S4 will be charged more over the A4, I would suggest going to an independant garage and have them put some decent discs and pads on.
If you do it yourself you will need a caliper screw, it fits on the caliper and you use a spanner to screw the piston back in, cost around 10-20£ here in uk.
Plenty of articles on audiworld, about how to change pads, Green stuff are fine, but I would get some Grooved or drilled discs, and some fast road pads, I have put 30k on my pads now and still they look like new.
Kevlar mix is what you should look for.
Zimmerman Discs and Pagid fast road pads, together cost around £200.00 about $300.00 us
Fron rotor set: $189.95-289.95 Fron pad set: $81 - 119.95 Rear rotor set: $149.95 - 189.95 rear pad set - $36.50 - 69.95
From
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Front rotor: $145 - 310 (2 needed) Front pads: $90 Rear pads: $45 (Rear rotors not in stock yet)
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Front rotors: $299.95 Rear rotors: $189.95 Front pads: 84.95 Rear pads: 36.95
I have seen many posts from VW/Audi owners praise about the Mintex "red-box" brake pads and I would go with that. They produce much less brkae dust and perform equal to stock pads and they are cheaper.
Not many choices for stock replacement rotors. It's either stock, DBA or no-name brand from ECS. DBA is the best and I don't know much about the no-name from ECS. I would say get them base on your budget.
If you plan to work on the brakes yourself then you should get this caliper tool (highly recommended by the people from the S4 forum over at audiworld.com):
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It's $40 and some people said it was once on sale for $30 but I never seen it on sale. I have a set myself but I haven't had the need to use it yet on my 2000 S4.
Well, the parts are not cheap ($500-700) even if you do it yourself but, hey, it's a 40K car. Gook luck.
You call folk names like that & don't like to be called back by one of the folk you insult?
If you want to check google, you'll see some of my more prolific insults, however I like this NG & the content is good. I don't want to bring it down to gutter level, but you are a fuckchop.
Not at all. I merely said that, for a guy called the "incredible" swearing man, your insults are rather lackluster. You'll have to excuse me if I expected too much.
This word, "prolific", I do not think it means what you think it means.
That's marginally better, I suppose. Get some rest, there's always tomorrow.
Indeed I am in NE Ohio. I called them already, and here is the price breakdown:
Front Pads (Mintex Red Box): $81 Rear Pads: $36.50 Labor: $85 Total: $202.50
Rotors were $289.95 for the front axle + labor.
They had the best price I found. I checked Autobahn and Fred Baker too. I'm not even going call those crooks at Cascade.
I think I'm going to buy Mintex pads from TireRack and install them myself. Audiworld had a couple good procedures, and it doesn't loook to be every difficult (famous last words).
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