Brake Rotors. Resurface or New?

[2458n]

On a 1 ton ford my rotor is still part of the front hub.You have to resurface as the hub and rotor together still costs a good deal. 4x4 and dually.

 

[Fawken]

$10 bucks locally to turn rotors, but I turn my own ( leftover equipment from my dads NAPA shop). I usually mic the thickness and check runout with every pad change, turn if needed. I am the only one that touches my brakes as I trust my skills against what see in the shops nowadays.

I had the brakes worked at the Ford dealer on my F350, I always wear old clothes when I pick up my vehicles as I will get on the ground and crawl under to verify work. Found two caliper bracket bolts missing, after speaking with the manager about safety concerns they ate the bill but said they could no longer work on my truck to which I told him he was correct.

Now that's what I'm talking about. The kids working on cars these days just don't pay attention to details. Like I said, I resurface my own- which is different than turning. If they need actual turning I just replace them. Lots of Youtube how-to vids for resurfacing. Never had one warp or pulse. I do them mounted to the hub.

 

[breadtrk]

Since they are coming from China anyway these days..... I get the cheap drilled and slotted rotors off FleBay. My time is valuable and it just don't make sense to haul them off, drop them, go back, pick them up, and then have them warping before the pads get broken in.

 

[JKR]

$10 bucks locally to turn rotors, but I turn my own ( leftover equipment from my dads NAPA shop). I usually mic the thickness and check runout with every pad change, turn if needed. I am the only one that touches my brakes as I trust my skills against what see in the shops nowadays.

I had the brakes worked at the Ford dealer on my F350, I always wear old clothes when I pick up my vehicles as I will get on the ground and crawl under to verify work. Found two caliper bracket bolts missing, after speaking with the manager about safety concerns they ate the bill but said they could no longer work on my truck to which I told him he was correct.

They no longer wanted work on your truck because you are better than the mechanic that worked on your truck and got paid for it.
What's wrong with this service manager. He should be happy he didn't have a law suit on his hand. The get fired.

 

[KubotaToy]

They no longer wanted work on your truck because you are better than the mechanic that worked on your truck and got paid for it.
What's wrong with this service manager. He should be happy he didn't have a law suit on his hand. The get fired.

I hate to admit it but I will mark nuts, bolts, filters with dykem torque paint marker before I take any vehicle in for service (which is rare that I do but sometimes I just do not have the time to work on them) especially if I cannot watch the work. I have caught more than a few shops not performing all the service they wanted to charge me for. I had a well regarded transmission shop manager swear they changed the filter during a trans service, I made him climb under my ranger and look at the 4 paint seals that were not broken, I asked him if they had a trick I could use in the future to not need to drop the pan to change the filter. To his credit he brought the tech out and made him look and asked him what happened. He just said he forgot, the manager told him to go home for a week without pay and told me no charge. In the mail a few weeks later I received a letter apologizing for the mistake and a coupon for a free service. Never used it, just cannot trust them now.

 

[PILOON]

I once had the dealer rebuild a carburetor as it constantly backfired on start at the same time they were to do all other routine maintenance.
That was on a leased auto and authorized by the lessor.
They kept the car 2 days to service it and called to say ready to pick up.
I signed the bill and hopped in to drive away.
POW and smoke curled from under the hood!
While they billed for the carb job, it was never touched as the smut and crud clearly showed. In fact the charged for air cleaner was still the original dirty oily one that was on when I brought them the car for service.

Good try guys!
(That dealership is long gone now)

 

[westcliffe01]

I make a point to do all brake repairs myself if at all possible. One of the major issues here in the midwest is corrosion due to road salt. A lot of the potential issues can be mitigated if one uses the high quality copper based anti seize compound between disk and hub and again between disk and wheel. None of the manufacturers use an effective anti seize at the factory and the dealers do not either (too cheap and if rusted the labor charge goes up).

On my F250 2008 model year, less than 80k miles on it, all servicing at the dealer, I found that it was impossible to remove the wheels from the axles when I wanted to work on the brakes. I ended up using a 14 ton hydraulic jack and chains to pull the wheels off the hubs and still had to pound on them with a sledge and heat the center of the steel wheel to get them to break free. After sorting out that nightmare (took most of a weekend to get all 4 wheels free), I moved on to removing the disks and that took hours of pounding and rotating with a sledge to get each off. The disks were completely mangled by the time I was done.

I ended up replacing all the disks and 2 calipers. All metal surfaces that made contact on assembly were coated with copper permatex anti seize. Now I have confidence that I will be able to do a tire change should I ever get a flat. If I had ever had a flat prior, I would have had a nasty surprise and gone for an expensive ride in a tow vehicle..

Just goes to show, the dealer never had the wheels off at any point during the previous 60k miles.

I have also had parking brakes worked on at my local Belle Tire and the techs do not seem to understand parking brakes anymore. Anyway, on my first trip after the rebuild one of the parking brake springs broke and got jammed in the brakes and made an awful noise. I had to stop at a tiny mechanics shop in a town where I didn't know anyone and they fixed it with a spring from their junk bin. Not long after I got home (2000 miles later) the spring on the opposite side broke.

Given the crappy service, I will rather work on my brakes myself...

 

[ovrszd]

Garages don't resurface rotors anymore, and haven't for probably 20 years. Their liability is too great, and customers will come back and complain about pulsing brake pedal, (warped rotors), etc., etc.
Brake jobs are expensive, but their are the first line of defense when one needs to stop, and they better work right when you need them.
It cost what it costs, parts, overhead, liability insurance, ASE certified mechanics, etc. I know, I owned and ran a shop.

That's simply not true. Many, many brake rotors are "turned" every day. It totally depends on the application and the damage to the rotors. If they have been heated repeatedly and over a long period of time before repairs are made they may be warped so bad that turning them will result in a thin rotor, not good. But if the owner is taking care of business and maintaining the brake system regularly the rotors can be turned a couple times minimum before they are discarded. Last week I had the rear rotors on my Super Duty turned and new pads installed.

 

[SPIKER]

I have had some turned and just as many replaced as new junkers are 20 bucks and costs 10 to turn them. If the fins (in Ohio RUST BELT) are flaking then trash them and buy new ones. My Truck rotors are 15+ years old and in great shape & are US made ones the china 20 buck ones usually are falling apart in 24 months of running.

I do all my own maintenance so keep care of them & have had some sticky wheels on cars I work on from new buy. If they are stuck, then loosen lug nuts and drive it around the yard some till it loosens up. then pop them off...

Mark

 

[ray66v]

That's simply not true. Many, many brake rotors are "turned" every day. It totally depends on the application and the damage to the rotors. If they have been heated repeatedly and over a long period of time before repairs are made they may be warped so bad that turning them will result in a thin rotor, not good. But if the owner is taking care of business and maintaining the brake system regularly the rotors can be turned a couple times minimum before they are discarded. Last week I had the rear rotors on my Super Duty turned and new pads installed.

I can tell you, in my area, there is only one parts store out of dozens, that still turns rotors.

Ceramic brake pads are often lasting long enough, to wear the rotors below the minimum thickness.

When you can get a lifetime warranty on rotors, it doesn't necessarily pay to turn them. If you plan on keeping the vehicle, you are going to be buying rotors sooner or later. Buy them at the first brake job, get the guaranteed ones, and then you get new ones when ever you need, no charge. Plus, you save the money you would spend having them turned.