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Soft brakes after replacing front pads only

MrNotEnglish

MrNotEnglish

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Location
East Cornwall
Car
2.4 i-vtec Ex Auto
Hello, I replaced brake pads on front axle (pagids) on my Accord 2.4 cl9 2004, 54k miles on the clock, now brake pedal feels softer than it was before replacement. I took off brake fluid reservior cap, pushed back caliper by hand with old pad on, finnished with one wheel, did the same on the other one. Didn't have to take any brake fluid by syringe, no spillage. It's plenty of fluid in there nearly half inch from the cap, no visual leaks anywhere, didn't touch any bleeding valve. Just brakes feel softer. With engine off when I pump pedal few times it gets hard and stays hard. With engine on when stationary pedal goes nearly to the floor every time, goes like half length in, then slower and lower. Doesn't stop higher when I push it couple times. What it could be? I did nearly 400 miles already, first 50-60 with careful braking to let them bed in, then rest of it on motorway. On first bite it feels soft but second one bites hard and pedal gets hard higher. I would not expect any air in brake system. Help please :)
 
pads can need time under braking to heat cycle/bed in. Motorway miles don't count.

You car will benefit from bleeding the brakes and replacing with fresh fluid. You could try some hard stops on a safe road just don't stop the car entirely and don't keep your foot on brake while stationary.
 
Thanks for reply Salim. Well, motorway miles were done in kinda spirited driving through traffic. Accelerating, stopping and again and again... I'll try stops as you write, if it won't change to better, I'll take it to a garage for fluid change (should be done now anyway)
Regards
Ps more sugestions very appreciated
 
Last time I replaced my front pads (also Pagids) the performance was scary. After bedding-in for a few hundred miles it recovered.
 
The pads will take some time to bed in so probably normal.
Also as Sal says bleed and change your fluid for good measure
 
The guys are right, maybe a bed in process will help.

Have you suffered any brake fluid loss?
 
Thanks you all guys for reply, no fluid loss, no leaks. Will see how are they after couple more miles ;)
Regards
 
I have founds Pagids to be a little less responsive. They are not the quality oe type replacements they once were Imo.

what are others peoples thoughts?
 
I think Pagid are OK - have seen the same effect with Bendix pads too, in both cases I'd not replaced the discs.

Previously (on a different motor) I fitted Pagid discs and pads on the front and the brakes were excellent within a very short distance.

Cheers
Robin
 
Did your front disks have much of a lip of rust on the outside edge? If they did and you didn't clean it off the pads could be contacting this first instead of the full face of the disk
 
Hi all,

Instead of driving carefully first million miles with new brake pads, I've always performed the following procedure:

For a typical performance brake system using street-performance pads, a series of ten partial braking events, from 60mph down to 10mph, will typically raise the temperature of the brake components sufficiently to be considered one bed-in set. Each of the ten partial braking events should achieve moderate-to-high deceleration (about 80 to 90% of the deceleration required to lock up the brakes and/or to engage the ABS), and they should be made one after the other, without allowing the brakes to cool in between.
Depending on the make-up of the pad material, the brake friction will seem to gain slightly in performance, and will then lose or fade somewhat by around the fifth stop (also about the time that a friction smell will be detectable in the passenger compartment). This does not indicate that the brakes are bedded-in. This phenomenon is known as a green fade, as it is characteristic of immature or ‘green' pads, in which the resins still need to be driven out of the pad material, at the point where the pads meet the rotors. In this circumstance, the upper temperature limit of the friction material will not yet have been reached.
As when bedding-in any set of brakes, care should be taken regarding the longer stopping distance necessary with incompletely bedded pads. This first set of stops in the bed-in process is only complete when all ten stops have been performed - not before. The system should then be allowed to cool, by driving the vehicle at the highest safe speed for the circumstances, without bringing it to a complete stop with the brakes still applied. After cooling the vehicle, a second set of ten partial braking events should be performed, followed by another cooling exercise. In some situations, a third set is beneficial, but two are normally sufficient.
Click to expand...
On all my cars, not only the accord, this exercise does the job, no squeeling afterwards. This is recommended by many race clubs, as race cars cannot drive carefully to bed in their pads. Actually, there is an article on the pagid website about the procedure but with higher speed which I don't believe is necessary for road cars:
http://speeds http://www.pagidracing.com/fileadmin/pagidracing/content_data/downloads/pagid_bedding_in_procedure.pdf

regards, Alex
 
Sorry, I don't follow. Are you saying that to bed-in brake pads, there are ten types of stopping/braking scenarios and as long as you do sac one giving the brakes sufficient time to cool down, they'll be bedded in?
 
Hi,

The procedure I follow (for any car, not necessarily honda) is:

accelerate the car to about 70mph (105-110km/h) and brake hard to 10mph (20km) without locking the wheels or coming to full stop
accelarate again, do the same, (about 8-10 times, depending on the road). At the half point, the smell from the pads will be strong, I can smell them in the accord too - you should not worry about that.
Then cruise around for about 10 minutes with a constant speed of 50-60mph without touching the brakes - to cool them down, then test the brakes, the pads should be bedded in

If not satisfied, repeat the procedure. I could recommend doing this late in the evening on a ring road or similar (low traffic, long straight to accelerate and brake)

It sounds and feels very harsh to the car and the brakes, but they should handle such stress, right? :)

PS: there is a slight chance of boiling the brake fluid if it's very very old, then the pedal will feel like a marshmellow.
 
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