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By REvans2001, June 7, 2014



Oh no, it's more brake noises! Has anyone been successful getting rid of the noise? The only one I read with success said he replaced rotors with Toyota's top line racing rotors and non-Toyota ceramic pads.

My 2011 Corolla started making brake grinding noise at slow speed after 60K (I am very about braking and got very good wear). Dealer did new pads and turned rotors. I was careful to do mostly long light braking for first 200 miles, avoiding hard stops. Now the sound is back after about 2K miles. Dealer replaced one set of pads and did another turn on the rotor but the noise was back before I even got it home!

Anyone have a solution because I would like to sell the car. I've read lots of similar complaints but only one success story changing to the top line racing rotors with non-Toyota pads. A lot of money to invest if only one good result. Anyone? Thanks!

Brake grinding noise? Remove wheel and inspect.

I'm with dom - remove the wheel and inspect the brake system.

Replacing the rotors and pads would be the last thing I'd try, and likely will not "fix" the problem, as the amount of work the dealership did would have been pretty similar to that. I am disappointed that they turned the rotors - the OEM rotors are pretty thin to begin with, unless they just took a skim coat, to clean up the surface of the rotors, turning them down would greatly shorten their overall life.

Sounds like caliper, slide pins, and or the pad clips are sticking and causing the pad to not fully push off the rotor. Also could need more grease or brake quiet compound on the back of the pads. Brakes will also make noise until they break in - if they haven't fully bedded in, the brakes will continue to exhibit squeaking and grinding noises until they take a set.

Grinding at low speeds while braking can come from a number of possible things. Hard to say for sure without looking at it. Even if the pad looks visually OK, have to pull the pads off the car and inspect them. Could be debris or pad contamination that is causing the braking noise.

While mine is a 2005 LE I had the exact same issue. We tore everything apart and cleaned/greased and anything that could done was. The rotors were turned and cleaned....new OEM pads. Still the same issue. New OEM pads...same issue. The noise...esp when say at 10mph was amazing.

But I finally solved it....I ripped out the fairly new OEM pads and stuck on the Duralast Gold CMax pads....perfect....car stops fine even with a few massive panick stops....and not a peep in like 12K miles. Maybe its they are ceramic...not sure.

Thanks everyone. I do believe it is the pads. This is how I solved it, at least for now: dealer skimmed off a little bit of the rotor and replaced pads. With the new pads, I used breaking-in techniques of hard braking without complete stops. (I brake hard to very slow, shift to neutral into a rolling speed and then use handbrake to engage the rear brakes). That seemed to do it after a long time of breaking in and never _stopping_ full on the front disc brakes.

Thanks again for sharing your experiences, comments and insights.

I've heard this on some other cars, it's a pad compound issue. It's not actual grinding but very bad vibration that sounds awful. Usually when the brakes are warm and at low speed, they still vibrate at higher speeds but the frequency is beyond human hearing. Sometimes compounds between the pad and caliper/bracket can help but when it's so extreme that it sounds like grinding it's probably not going to help enough.

Are they using OE pads or the Value-line pads? Toyota has two lines of brake pads, what your car came with from the factory and the 'get them in the door' priced value pads. Odds are if you ask them, they'll fess up that they're using the value pads. Get the OE factory pads and see if the noise is gone or switch to aftermarket. Akebono and Wagner both make some ceramic pads.

Thanks Cirrus, Bitter and all. The brake service included a $50 rebate from Toyota, so I guess they are the "get 'em in the door" brake set. It's been another month now, and all ok after the brake seasoning and I still avoid braking to a full stop. The carefully planned braking leaves more space in front of me to avoid complete stop so I expect the gas mileage will improve as well as safer driving! I have made notes of your advice for future reference. Cheers!

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