As you can see in the title, i'm cheap, and have a bunch of old brake pads with about 85% of their pads left, i replaced the old set because ONE pad was wearing out faster than the others (sticky caliper slider thing). So i fixed that and put on the new pads, but now it's doing it on the other side... so i was just going to pop off the caliper, cleanup the sliders again and throw on an old pad....

I know you're not SUPPOSED to do this.. but i'm a cheap bastard.. am i going to warp my rotors, or mess up anything by doing this... i mean.. the pads are still good, they just need a little breaking in (get it.. ohh... i'm funny ), maybe a nice trip to the highway with the brakes engaged... hmm.....

you should have no problem at all, i`ve done it many times.

install and ride on. you will experience no issues if everything else is up to par. did you clean up/grease the slides? if so then your braking system is likely more adequate than half the 98's on the road today in terms of pad wear and rotors. look at it this way....did you have any issues the last 10,000 miles or 5,000? the caliper and rotor really doesn't "know" how thick the pad is, so long as pressure is evenly applied. if it did make a difference you (and i in the past) would notice it in the braking. no dice though. works fine.

 

that being said, be sure to check them often (when you rotate tires on your awesome locking transfer clutch machine) to be sure you're missing one wearing down faster than the others (since it started with less).

as a matter of fact a friend showed up at my house in maryland one day with a box of front pads and said he was leaving from my house to go to alabama (never called ahead of time??). pulled the calipers and one side had nothing in it but metal shards and what some might call a rotor and the other side basically had a backing plate left. the rotors were torn to bits, shreds, shavings and grooves everywhere. he essentially made me slap the pads on it and left for alabama and drove the truck like that from then on. i guess the pads eventually wore into the rotor grooves just fine, he said they worked great.

Are the pads different brand/manufacturer/model?

 

The issue you could run into is if they are different pad compounds, they could apply different brake forces, and cause the car to pull to one side or the other. You really should have identical pad types, etc on the left & right side of the car.

 

Safety aside...you should be alright with putting the old rotors on. Depending on the pad compound and break in, it's possible to get some uneven pad deposits...but probably not overly likely.

The trick to running slightly different compounds is to put one pad of each type on each side. That said if they are close enough it may be fine. Mailmen are known to swap just one side.

They're both NAPA sets... i did it up, no problems yet... except i found a nice tear in my CV boot

Grease EVERYWHERE... arg....

They're both NAPA sets... i did it up, no problems yet... except i found a nice tear in my CV boot

Grease EVERYWHERE... arg....

 

damn.

 

I need to do a brake job on the legacy soon.. got new pads for front.. new master cylinder and new rubber lines for all the way around... just gotta get some time

Your right about us mail people, I keep pads and shoes that still have some wear and put them where ever they are needed if one of the other ones break or wear uneven.

The trick to running slightly different compounds is to put one pad of each type on each side. That said if they are close enough it may be fine. Mailmen are known to swap just one side.

They're both NAPA sets... i did it up, no problems yet... except i found a nice tear in my CV boot

Grease EVERYWHERE... arg....

 

if it's any consolation i've driven 2 years and 50,000 miles on broken front cv boots and 100,000 on broken rear boots (they never even click). made it about 50,000 miles until i drove off road in some sand...that tore the crap out of them. they were clicking while driving straight at that point. made it 800 miles from GA to MD. squirted grease in there and they actually quieted up and went back to clicking mostly while turning. but i replaced it right after that anyway. clicking while going straight is a little unnerving! anyway, i have broken boots on my XT6 i'm daily driving right now and they've been like that awhile, no big deal. i'll wait 'til summer and a tire rotation or brake job to worry about it. i even have extra axles on hand, not worth my time though until it's warm i'm in in there for something else.

 

hopefully yours is not the one that sprays on the exhaust and smokes off.

You might as well get some mileage out of that axle if you are going to replace it anyway.

 

TC both my uncle and and a family friend up in Maine did the same thing you do on thier mail routes. The family friend could replace brake pads on his mail car so fast it looked like an Indy pit stop.

Cookie, I am not that fast, but I do get lots of practice, around three sets of pads a year and maybe one set of shoes ever year. I keep my 14mm and 17mm hanging by my work space, and have a 80lb torque stick handy for the lugs. I still have trouble with that little c- clip on the emg. brake bracket that is hooked to rear shoe.

You might as well get some mileage out of that axle if you are going to replace it anyway.

 

TC both my uncle and and a family friend up in Maine did the same thing you do on thier mail routes. The family friend could replace brake pads on his mail car so fast it looked like an Indy pit stop.

Best luck I've had with the C clip is to put the assembly in my vice which I bought the first time I had to do brakes and struts on this car. I open the clip with a hammer and an old screwdriver that fits well. I reinstall with pliars after flattening the clip. If I try to do this with the emergency brake lever still on the car it drives me nuts. In the vice it's five minutes a side max.

That sounds like a really good ideal with the vice, I will try that next time. Thanks!

Best luck I've had with the C clip is to put the assembly in my vice which I bought the first time I had to do brakes and struts on this car. I open the clip with a hammer and an old screwdriver that fits well. I reinstall with pliars after flattening the clip. If I try to do this with the emergency brake lever still on the car it drives me nuts. In the vice it's five minutes a side max.