944 Brake Pads

[ripton]

The Brake Pad light has lit up on my dash board. (it's an 87 944 turbo) I've not had a chance to get the wheels off yet - it only happened on the way to the station this morning.

The pads are about 6,000 miles old. Is this normal or could it be attributed to the recent MOT observation that the rear pads are dragging?

Chris

>> Edited by ripton on Wednesday 17th May 13:06

[Big Les]

I would think the first thing to do is check the pad wear sensors are located properly into the pads. Check the wiring to the sensors to ensure there are no shorts (circuits!). If you are still having a problem you may need to get the wiring checked back to the engine bay, I had a similar problem on my '89 S2 and after quite a bit of investigation an auto electrician found a wire had been rubbing against the body work, had worn through and was causing ashort and making the warning light come on.

[ripton]

Sounds fairly sensible. Is that a pads off job to check the proper fitment of the sensor?

Worn or dodgy wiring would not surprise me, it has ahd a few other electrical issues- a voracious appetite for fuses, a worn wire to one of the head lights and a random front offside indicator failure (not the fuse or the bulb).

Sometimes I think that I should seperate the whole car into it's component parts and rebuild it

[wildoliver]

To be honest it sounds like it could just do with a good bottoming.

Spend a weekend tidying your wiring, removing the junk, and repairing problems, and you will enjoy the car so much more!

[matt951]

'good bottoming' - not sure i like the sound of that

[ripton]

Neither do I! I am aiming to spend a weekend on the wiring, it doesn't help that of all the different aspects of automotive engineering that seems the darkest of arts!

[wildoliver]

Trust me its not that hard once you get in to it!

[hab]

ripton said:

Neither do I! I am aiming to spend a weekend on the wiring

May the Grace of God be with you.

[zcacogp]

hab said:

ripton said: Neither do I! I am aiming to spend a weekend on the wiring May the Grace of God be with you.

Not so ... if you have a good multimeter, a soldering iron, some heat-shrink tubing and some cable ties, it is amazing how much you can tidy a badly-wired car up. Don't forget to do things properly - no scotch-block connectors - and keep things clean, and wiring faults are often easily traced.

It can also be very satisfying to remove the remains of old, badly-fitted alarms and HiFi from a newly-pursched car. I have removed several hundred metres of old wire from both of my last cars, and the satisfaction was immense.


Oli.