Brake Discs - severe corrosion!

[BULLITT782]

Hi all

 

I drive a Subaru Impreza and 12months ago I upgraded the brakes to the Prodrive / Alcon 4 pot calipers and 330mm Discs.

 

The discs needed replaced and I bought a pair of Discs from Godspeed Brakes in August / September 2009 at a cost of £410. I specifically went for these as they advertise via Scoobynet and offer a guarantee on the discs.

 

Last month I posted this on Scoobynet;

 

I have the Prodrive/Alcon 330mm brake set up on my classic. Last August/Sept I bought Godspeed Discs to replace the originals which had warped.

 

All has been fine up until about 2 - 3 months ago I get a hard vibration through the steering when braking at anything over 15mph.

 

Thanks to having a work van, the car is only driven on weekends so I've covered less than 5000miles on these new discs, before going down the warped discs route and claiming them on warranty is there anything else is could be?

 

The only other thing I could put it down to would be tracking but surely I would get the vibration at the time or the car would wander if this was the case?

 

Any ideas people?

 

This was Godspeed's reply

 

Hi

As the car is only driven on weekends , it could be rust on the discs behind the bells causing the bells to lift from the disc , enough to make them run untrue.

You could take the bells off the discs and clean them up with WD40 and some fine emery cloth , or send them back to me to do for you , and check them out to make sure they are 100%.

You should also check the calipers , these are buggers for corroding under the pad retaining lugs at the end of each pad , they are the metal plates bolted into the calipers , you can get corrosion under these which pushes the plates off the calipers , which tightens them onto the pads and can make the pads seize in the calipers , this can end up overheating a disc and end up warping it

Cheers Ian

 

After following these instructions I stripped the brakes and found this had happened to the Discs

 

Off Side Disc

 

 

 

Near Side Disc

 

 

This picture clearly shows where part of the surface of the disc has broken off

 

 

After cleaning them up as much as possible I reported what I'd found to Godspeed Brakes

 

Hi Ian

 

Following on from this thread I followed your instructions on inspecting an cleaning the discs.

 

When I've taken the discs off I've found not just surface rust but severe corrosion over 2/3 of both discs which has damaged the surface of the disc beyond repair. As said in that thread, the car hasn't even covered 5000miles since these brakes were purchased in August/September 2009.

 

Here are some pics of the inside surface of the disc;

 

Off Side Disc

 

 

Near Side Disc

 

 

This picture clearly shows where part of the surface of the disc has broken off

 

 

This has made the car totally undriveable and unsafe. I would like to make a warranty claim for a replacement set please.

 

Regards,

 

 

The PM was sent Sunday afternoon, I wasn't expecting a reply at the weekend so waited for a reply during the week. Everyday I have looked and he had logged in everyday at varying times during the day and not replied.

 

Tonight I sent this email

 

This is my second contact attempt to you regards the corroded brake discs purchased from Godspeed Brakes in August/September 2009 - Purchased via cheque and sent to RE Motorsport for fitting.

 

 

If you would like to discuss this matter vocally, my contact number is .

 

Due to the lack of initial communication, if I have not received a response from yourself regarding this claim within 10 days I will be seeking legal advice on the grounds of faulty goods.

 

Regards,

 

This was the reply I received

 

You making a claim on discs that have rusted away ? this has happened because you must have parked the car up for a period of time , and not used it , if a car is used regular then this would never happen , we will skim the discs to get back to a good surface , but I will not change them as its not the fault of the discs that this has happened , so please , dont threaten me.

 

Discs are make from cast steel / iron , which is one of the worst materials for rusting , if they dont get used , they will rust , yours must have been unused for some time to end up like that , I have seen 8 year old discs that are not as bad as yours look , so it it not the fault of the discs.

 

Send them back to me and I will skim them for you to make them useable again

 

I have replied stating that of the previous 3 sets of brake discs that have been on the car non have degraded in such a manner as these have even though the car has been used under the exact same conditions since I've owned it.

 

I'm sorry for the long thread, I thought it best to cover the whole situation in one go.

 

Would the faulty goods act come into these situation?

 

Even though he has "offered" to skim them, currently there has been no mention of a cost, I'm not up on the legalities of warranties and where I stand on making a claim as the car currently would not pass an MOT with the brakes in this condition so any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Edited May 24, 2010 by BULLITT782

[dx100uk]

sadly alot of what is being said is true, discs will rust if not used, you must also bear-in-mind the exceptional weather we have had this winter.

 

however, if they are offering to shim FOC then that is alike to what would happen to say a faulty TV under soga...a repair.

 

if this fails then a replacement will be in order.

 

SOGA clearly states a product should be fit for purpose over a resonsable time, less than a year for rarely used discs does NOT meet this criteria.

 

dx

[MARTIN3030]

Skimming is not a good gesture really though is it?

In fact is something rarely done these days-aside from having to replace with new ones.

[dx100uk]

agreed

 

dx

[traffer]

Those disks do look pretty grim. The salt season this year has been longer than others and due to the snow/rain, more salty water has been thrown around.

 

Having said that, my car (not a Subaru) has had a similar usage over the last 2 winters and the disks are fine.

 

To pursue a claim, you would probably need to do a comparative corrosion test with original or known good disks. Cast iron is available in many grades and there is a wide difference in corrosion performance. It would be interesting to have a good look at the microstructure of the disks you have to see if they are suffering from porosity. All this, however, can cost money.

[heliosuk]

This is an interesting one in that it is a performance upgrade. With brake systems there are various ways of increasing the performance, the simplest of which is increasing the contact area of the pad to the disc i.e bigger ones. By doing this you have to increase the size of caliper to accomodate the disc. However the size of the disc is dictated by the weight that it has to stop and the amount of heat it has to dissapate. With these aftermarket kits to get a noticable effect you would then soften the disc. The trade off is increased wear and corrosion due to the softer material of the disk. Now the pads on these kits are usually hardened to lessen the effect of fade but cut through any surface treatment very quickly.

 

On standard discs, which would normally be accepted as being more than adequate for road use in the UK, then you would expect 2 sets of pads to a set of disks depending on type of use, but then these would also have anti corrosion properties in the disc as well such as a higher ratio of chrome etc.

 

Looking at the pictures you have supplied I'd say you have little come back as one of them shows a clear lip on the disc, indicative of the scenario above.

 

Frankly I'd go back to standard and use your performance upgrade for track days. Afterall, your car does not have a reputation for poor brake performance!!

[tam9933]

i repalce discs 6 times a day and see lots of bad discs , cheep discs , rusty discs , your discs are junk , bad steel most likley , tell them to replace them now , do not apcept a skim

[Conniff]

i repalce discs 6 times a day and see lots of bad discs , cheep discs , rusty discs , your discs are junk , bad steel most likley , tell them to replace them now , do not apcept a skim

 

Unfortunately they are 12 months old so it's not as easy as saying 'they are junk, replace'. It will be up to the customer to prove they are junk and this could be costly. Should they prove to be of inferior quality, then the laboratory fee would be refunded.

 

I fear you are going to have to accept that they need replacing or if they are not yet to minimum, then accept a skim.

[heliosuk]

As Conniff says unless you get a lab test then it's going to be hard to go anywhere with this. You need to bare in mind as well that these are a performance upgrade and I wouldn't mind betting that there is some small print getting out of it.

 

A brake performance upgrade done properly for the use on the road AND track will usually come in at around £5,000.......not £435!!!

[BULLITT782]

£5000 will be for a fully adjustable Brake upgrade for race use only ie. muh higher operating temperatures.

 

The Brake upgrade is the Subaru approved Prodrive / Alcon performance upgrade that was offered originally on the Impreza P1 for £1200 extra and not a cheap kit, about right for 330mm big brake upgrade. This kit is also available as a the Alcon Tarmac Rally kit via Demon Tweeks for around £1500.

 

Other kits are available at roughly the same price; Brembo, AP Racing etc with K-Sport's kit been even cheaper! The only kits to my knowledge that have a starting price higher than £1500 is Endless Brakes & Project Mu.

 

I got the kit cheap via another member of Scoobynet, I wanted to keep the performance parts Subaru/STI/Prodrive as much as possible so bought this kit. They were cheap because the seller's car had been written off, I paid £500 for the kit, obviously second hand.

 

These new Brake Discs (just the discs) were then purchased from Godspeed, who advertises on Scoobynet, at a cost of £410. I was assured these ones were ideal for the kit I had.

 

Basically from the email replies, it is been implied that this corrosion is my fault for not using the car more often but so far, I have been offered the Skimming of the discs F.O.C. (which I would've expected at the very least) and been told that it is a 24hr turn around for the skimming to be done and sent back to me. He has also stated that the guarantee will still be valid on the skimmed discs.

[Conniff]

The skim would be a gesture of good will and not an admission that there is a fault with the product.

Do you understand that it will be up to you to show there is a material/manufacturing problem?

[BULLITT782]

Yeah I understand that though I would've thought it would have been evident of a material/manufacture defect with the way these Discs have corroded like they have under the exact same conditions as the previous Brake Discs. The Genuine Prodrive discs supplied with the kit were the same size as these and they didn't corrode at all.

[heliosuk]

Looking at the state of them and that lip I wouldn't accept a skim. In fact, with respect you'd be very silly. Just by looking at them, to get back to a decent finish I would say, with an educated guess, that it will take them well below the minimum thickness recommended. This in turn would remove any surface treatment they had been given though I doubt they had any. Reality is it needs new discs.

 

£1500 is extrodinary good value. What does it include??

[BULLITT782]

Larger 4pot calipers

328mm vent & slotted discs

Prodrive Pads

 

Not sure whether braided hoses are included in that on the P1 but I have Goodridge braided hoses on my car.

[heliosuk]

Can't see how they do it for that unless they use carry over calipers from something else. Braided hoses make a hell of a difference. Learn't that from my bikes so had some made for my car for the front's and rears and the change in response was incredible.

[BULLITT782]

Here's a 50/50 pic of the OEM Subaru calipers and 294mm disc on the right, and the Prodrive/Alcon caliper and 328mm disc on the left

 

 

They upgrade is a direct bolt on kit