Brake Pad Sensor

The brake pad sensor is a single-use, but nevertheless essential piece of equipment. It performs the job of alerting you when your brake pads are wearing thin, which in turn triggers a warning light to indicate that it’s time to replace the brakes. In constant use or when placed under high levels of friction, a car's brake pad will inevitably wear down. When the pad has worn to a pre-programmed point, the brake pad sensor makes contact with the metal of the brake disc and completes an electrical circuit; this action sends a signal to the dashboard in the form of a warning light. Once a brake pad sensor has completed a circuit through contact with the rotor, it cannot be reused. Every time you change your brake pads you also need to install a new brake pad sensor. It’s recommended that you replace the brake pad sensor even if it has not made contact. The brake pad sensor is a real advance in automotive safety and your car will not pass its MOT if it has a faulty sensor.

Brake Pad Wear Sensors. On most German imports, there are brake pad wear sensors. These are more than just wires that break when the last 3 mm to 5 mm of pad material make contact with the disc. These sensors can warn the driver and technician of the state of the brake pads long before it becomes a safety problem.

The most common type of service required for brakes is changing the pads. Disc brake pads usually have a piece of metal on them called a wear indicator. When enough of the friction material is worn away, the wear indicator will contact the disc and make a squealing sound. This means it is time for new brake pads.

Once a brake pad sensor has completed a circuit through contact with the disc, it cannot be reused. Every time you change your brake pads you also need to install a new brake pad sensor. It's recommended that you replace the brake pad sensor even if it has not made contact.

Brake pad sensors generally consists of a rubber enclosed wire loop. The loop is installed in a predetermined location on the pad. Once the pad wears down past this point, the wire becomes frayed and/or cut, breaking the circuit which your ECU (engine computer) will detect.

The Brake Pad Wear sensor, or brake wear indicator, is an added safety feature on many vehicles used to warn a vehicle's driver if their brake pad's life becomes too low. The Brake Pad Wear sensor is mounted on the brake pad and routed through the callipers in any combination of the four wheels.

A Brake wear indicator is used to warn the user and/or owner of a vehicle that the brake pad is in need of replacement. However, brake wear indicators are also useful for brake pads in industrial applications, including wind turbines and cranes.

The second most common reason for causing a brake light on your dash is if your brake fluid is low. There is a sensor that is inside the brake master cylinder that can tell when the fluid gets low. This sensor will illuminate the brake warning light to let the driver know that the brake system needs attention asap.

Some vehicles use an electronic sensor to warn you, the driver, when your brake pads are starting to get too worn down from the rigors of driving. This is called the brake pad wear sensor, also known as the brake pad wear indicator. The most common type of electronic wear sensors is mounted into the brake pad itself. On some applications the wear sensor is embedded into the pad and not removable; therefore, they are only available with the brake pad. When the brake pad wears down to its discard thickness due to contacting the disc while braking over the course of time, the sensor will make contact to the disc, thus grounding the sensor. This will cause a brake warning light to illuminate on your dash or instrument cluster, indicating that the brake pad friction material is almost gone and that replacement brake pads are needed. This light usually looks like a circle, sometimes with an exclamation mark inside of it. Brake pad wear indicators are more prevalent on European models. They are usually found on the front brakes, but sometimes on the rear brakes as well. So, how many sensors a vehicle will have, and their location in terms of what wheels they can be found on will vary.

In most car repair shops, brake jobs are part of the daily bread-and-butter, straight forward repairs that involve parts replacement with little or no diagnosis. Occasionally, however, a job of this sort can throw you an unexpected curve. One such kink in the otherwise straight path of a brake job involves the car that comes in with the brake pad warning light on and, upon inspection, needs pad replacement at one or both ends. After replacement and service of the disc (if necessary) has been completed and the car is test driven, the pad warning is still glowing brightly in the instrument cluster. The wear sensors were not replaced because they looked fine no broken wires, no contact with the brake disc.

Sometimes, the worst part of getting your car fixed is having to bring it to the garage. We are therefore happy to offer our customers a free collection and delivery service If you prearrange a collection, we will pick your car up from your home or place of work and drive it to our premises, carry out all the necessary work (having consulted you) and deliver it back to you at the end of the day.

We are able to tow, jump start or repair your vehicle if you are experiencing problems or broken down for a small fee. If we can't sadly start your vehicle, we can contact a local recovery firm to collect your vehicle for a very competitive price.

Don't want to waste your day off?
You don't have the time to take your car in for a service or repairs?
Have you got problems with getting to and from the garage?

Here at Car Services in Reading, we believe that we offer a valuable product with our Free Collection and Delivery Service, we can collect either from your place of work or from your home address. If you are unsure about whether the address you are considering having your vehicle collected from is not within our range, then please do contact us.

Car Services in Reading operate a fleet of pool cars with a dedicated driver, so wherever we are collecting from, we need to be able to leave one of our pool vehicles either in your work car park / parking space, or if in a residential area, we would need to be able to leave our car either at your house or on the road with a permit if required. We would be grateful if you could bear this in mind when booking to use our free Collection and delivery service