New brakes squeaking - labour or part issue

[MervJnr]

Recently had discs and pads replaced all round. I supplied the parts (from a well known premium brand for both discs and pads) as they were a fair amount cheaper for me to buy from a motor factors than the garage were quoting.

Garage made a point of saying there is no warranty on the parts - absolutely fair enough. Now, after being fitted and allowing ~1000 miles to bed in, the brakes are continuing to squeak under light application - just normal day to day driving. Seems to have become worse over the past week.

Assuming this is enough distance to for them to be bedded in by now, what would people's recommendations be in terms of who to contact first?

The way I imagine it playing out: the garage take a look, say they've done everything required of them on their end and send me to the supplier, who I then imagine will possibly send me back to a (different?) garage to have them inspected? Anyone else had a similar situation?

Thanks in advance

[Zio Di Roma]

MervJnr said:

Recently had discs and pads replaced all round. I supplied the parts (from a well known premium brand for both discs and pads) as they were a fair amount cheaper for me to buy from a motor factors than the garage were quoting.

Garage made a point of saying there is no warranty on the parts - absolutely fair enough. Now, after being fitted and allowing ~1000 miles to bed in, the brakes are continuing to squeak under light application - just normal day to day driving. Seems to have become worse over the past week.

Assuming this is enough distance to for them to be bedded in by now, what would people's recommendations be in terms of who to contact first?

The way I imagine it playing out: the garage take a look, say they've done everything required of them on their end and send me to the supplier, who I then imagine will possibly send me back to a (different?) garage to have them inspected? Anyone else had a similar situation?

Thanks in advance

Only in so far as I had a golden rule "never, under any circumstances, buy brake components from anyone other than the main dealer".

So, when I got a quote for £3k to replace my brakes I broke my golden rule and bought Brembo. They squealed like a stuck pig. The garage replaced them with other non-OEM pads and they still squeak. I am now going to have the same issue as you and will probably end up buying OEM.

Though I have the advantage that the garage supplied and fitted mine.

[GreenV8S]

MervJnr said:

I supplied the parts

That's almost always a bad idea. In the event of any problems, you can end up with the fitters blaming the parts and the parts supplier blaming the fitter, with you stuck in the middle. You're also unlikely to save much money. If the fitter also supplies the parts its in their interests to buy parts good enough to avoid warranty problems, and they can probably negotiate a better price than you can.

Curing brake squeal is more of an art than a science. To cure it you need to change the resonant frequency of the parts that are squealing. Here are some techniques which have worked for me in the past. I usually go through the list until the squeal stops. Note that it can come back as parts wear and accumulate dust and what worked last time may not work next time:

• fit an anti-squeal shim
• remove the anti-squeal shim
• add or remove anti-squeal paste
• bevel the front and rear training edges of the pads
• ensure the sliders are clean and greased
• ensure the pad bearing surfaces are cleaned and lightly greased