john_eldorado

delete

whoover

Your rear brakes are smaller because they do less braking. Properly engineered, front and rears will wear at the same rate. 40,000 is unusually long life for the fronts, and about right for the rears.

If you're not getting hit for front rotors, the dealer is being very honest. In my experience, S-classes often need front rotors by 40,000 miles and rears by 80,000.

softgenious

How long do the pads last on a S550? I have seen guys replacing them after 20K miles. I heard that you can not turn the rotors so replacing them every 40K is what I have heard.

whoover

It will depend largely on your driving style. You replace them when they're worn close to the wear limit. Similarly you replace the rotors when they're thinner than the limit. You never turn them. If you don't trust your service department, find one you can or get under the car and measure the pad wear yourself.

john_eldorado

Thanks for the replies.

The car is actually not mine, but my elderly father's. He recently had the work done on it, and I feel he got ripped off.

I tend to do work on cars myself, and have done brake jobs before. I also used to be a car wholesaler. On every car I've owned, a vehicle usually goes through around two sets of front brake pads before the rear brake pads need to be replaced. That's how 90% of cars are, unless Mercedes has a unique braking system on their cars (which is why I'm asking here). I don't question the front pads are probably due for replacement, it just seems to me the rears should last quite a bit longer. I've never heard of a car with less than 40k miles needing new brakes on all four wheels. A car with 100,000 miles on the original rear pads is not uncommon.

My experience with dealerships is they usually rip you off in recommending services you don't really need. A big profit center for the is "scheduled maintenance" items. These service writers tend to prey upon people that don't know much about cars (like my father). I've had dealers tell me I need new brake pads (when I haven't asked), have turned them down and inspected them and seen they have quite a bit of life left in them. That's sort of the name of the game for stealerships, and most people who buy a six figure car just aren't going to question a service recommendation.

NJS430

I don't think you have enough to warrant accusing the dealership of "ripping off" your father. I think if they were going to rip him off they would have replaced all of the rotors as well. The pads on the rear wheels are quite a bit smaller.

john_eldorado

They did replace all four rotors as well.

The reason why I'm asking in this forum is to find out if this particular model Mercedes wears through its rear brake pads that quickly. I was hoping an MB technician or someone familiar with the car's braking system could give me some more information on the model.

I'm not attempting to smear a particular dealer, but I do generally have a low opinion of dealerships in general. I know a lot people in the dealership industry, both technicians and sales people, and they'll be the first to tell you how shady dealerships can be.

irieblue

hmm... Did the Break wear indicators trigger a warning on the dash? If the brake wear indicators didn't go off, I don't think it was necessary to replace the pads. Especially if your Dad isn't a retired F1 driver

The other reason would have been if the pads were squeaking or the rotors were obviously scoured.

RajwanyS550

they ripped U Off...................

john_eldorado

Yep, they sure did. I took a look at the invoice, and to change the front and rear brakes and rotors, plus the fluid change, the bill came to around $1,400.

The car had even less miles than I thought, only 32k miles.

The Mercedes dealership was:

Phoenix Motor Company
1147 E Camelback Rd
Phoenix, AZ 85014

I hate seeing people get ripped off.

BMWFanboyy

I don't know if they prematurely changed your pads and rotors but depending on the labor rate where you are that price is OK for a dealership. It should be pretty obvious to you if the rotors needed replacing when you're driving the car.

softgenious

So you will get a light when the brake pads need to be replaced? Why change them out early then?

I also think $1400 is not bad considering that the dealer did the work. Only sucks if they did not need to be done. Sounds like with the mileage, that they were close to having to be taken care of.

JonMBZ

Front pads usually do go out first on MB's, but at 40k I had already done brakes/rotors all around my car twice at that mileage. I have a BMW though that I drive pretty hard.

irieblue

Based on the price list on parts.com which carries OEM Mercedes Benz parts..
S550
Rotor / Pad
Front 86 / 63 x2 = $298
Rear 63 / 51 x2 = $228

So the parts alone are $526, thus the dealer charged you $874 to install, at $175 per hour the rate in my area, that equates to 5 Hrs... Did they charge a disposal fee?

When it comes time to replace my Pads/rotors, I'm going to be doing some type of upgrade to Bigger brakes, as I have never really been impressed with the stock brakes on the S550 since they don't stop better than any other car I've owned which is probably attributed to the 4 piston in the front and 1 piston in the rear. Even the lower cost Japanese cars come standard with that now. I think 6 Pistons front and 4 rear should be standard on the S, and the anemic 13.2" front and 11.2" rotors rear are a cheap *** cop out in Mercedes part for such a heavy vehicle. My Lexus SUV has bigger rotors on the front..

whoover

Those sound pretty low for dealer retail parts prices. They also did a fluid flush, which is probably a couple of hundred bucks. The fluid flush is recommended, and is a good idea, every two years -- preferably in the spring if the winter is the rainy season.

whoover

You can't beat the S65 brakes if you're thinking of upgrading. The rears are bigger than those fronts. But you won't get a rotor for $63 anymore.

john_eldorado

My issue isn't with the price they charged my father for the work (although it is awfully high) I'm sure that's the going rate for that work at all Mercedes dealerships. It's the fact they recommended work that wasn't needed in the least.

It probably did need new front brake pads, but the service writer saw the owner probably didn't know any better, and decided to tell him the rear brake pads also needed to be replaced. Most service writers are paid on commission, so they'll do anything to get as much work done as possible. To do the front and rear brakes, an oil job, and to change the cabin air filter, the total price came to $1800.

The brake pad light never lit up on the car, and I've yet to hear anyone present evidence that Mercedes has a unique braking system where the rear pads wear out twice as fast as every other car on the road. A car with 32k mainly highway miles doesn't need new rear brake pads. I just hope other people who might read this don't get suckered by the service writer when they take their car in. A healthy amount of skepticism is a good thing to have when working with car dealerships.

BTW, this is my father's second brand-new S class Mercedes, and it's also been a lemon like the last one. It's a gorgeous car that drives like a dream, but he's had a lot of problems with it. Mercedes used to be the gold standard when it comes to reliability, but the last few cars might just push him into a Lexus dealership.

irieblue

Please do tell what the issues are that you consider it to be a Lemon..

softgenious

I am sorry but if you are unhappy you and your father should stop buying Mercedes. How do you know the brakes did not need replacing? With those miles I bet you that they were most likely close to needing to be done.

I purchased a Lexus GS430 for my mom a few years ago and it's a nice car but those brakes only lasted around 25K miles(50% highway miles). Lexus tells you in the manual that they are performance pads and usually need to be replaced in 20K or so miles.

She has also had 3-4 recalls concerning the brakes and power steering system, so Lexus is also not perfect. I just think that any car today that has so many electronics, most likely you will have issues.

I worry about my mother when she needs to have service done, but my uncle takes care of it and he is VERY knowledgeable about cars. Good luck and just forget about the past and move forward.

whoover

The distribution of braking force in a typical RWD sedan is 2/3 front and 1/3 rear. That car has twice as many pads (sweeping 15% greater rotor area) up front as in the rear. Twice the pad area for twice the braking force. It's not "unique," it's just a modern braking system engineered for balanced braking force and balanced wear.

If you think your dealer is ripping you off, tell them you want the used parts. Mike them and haul their asses in front of Judge Judy.

irieblue

Here is an 07 S550 in LA, that has 32,076

http://losangeles.craigslist.org/sgv...099510062.html

in the following image the Brake Wear indicator is lit up on the dash. This car only has 32K.

http://images8.ecarlist.com/photos/1...973/640/13.jpg

LILBENZ230

For what it's worth, we had 6 Honda Accords in our household for several years in the early 2000s and all of them wore the rear pads out first. I don't think it is entirely unheard of these days.

Dogshine

you state that you work on cars yourself. Which brand of cars? I don't believe you are working on Mercedes or even Bmw because if you did, your experience would be different. The way brakes wear on a honda, toyota or other are different than on these cars.

You are driving a mercedes s class, heavy car to stop, and it appears this is the price to play.