My brake bedding was backwards for 5 years, warped rotors on the freeway

For like 5 years I was doing the old 'drive fast and slam on the brakes' method to bed in new pads. Last month I put on a fresh set and within 2 days the steering wheel was shaking like crazy on the highway. Turns out I was building up uneven pad material because I was stopping from too high a speed too many times without letting the rotors cool. My buddy who runs a shop in Cleveland told me to do 6 gentle stops from 40 mph instead and then a few from 60 mph with full cooling in between. Fixed the pulse immediately and now I'm wondering how many rotors I cooked early with my old habit. Anyone else learn a brake trick way later than they should have?

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emma_mitchell19d ago

That whole "drive fast and slam on the brakes" thing is exactly what I used to do, and I swear I read somewhere that most guys get it backwards because it feels more like you're actually doing something. My cousin had the same issue with his truck and he cooked two sets of rotors before a guy at AutoZone told him the same thing you just said, about the slow stops and letting them cool. I never knew the heat buildup was the real killer, I always thought you just needed to get them hot and that was it. The pulsing in the pedal is one of those things that makes you feel like your whole front end is gonna fall apart, so I get why you'd want to fix it fast. I bet a ton of people are still out there doing the old way and just blaming cheap parts when it's actually their method.