In the past 2 weeks or so, I noticed something strange with my car. Whenever it's wet out and I have the car parked for a while and just start driving, my initial attempt at braking isn't very good. Probably water in between the rotor and pads, right? Obvious, right? However, it has never happened to me before and I've had this car for over 2 years now.

Is this a sign of brake pad wear? I'm on my original OEM pads and I have ~55K miles on the car. The pads aren't worn down significantly, although I could use a new set prior to the summer months. Is this what could cause my problem?

In addition (and this is scary), when I'm on the highway at highway speeds (in the rain/wet) and I brake, the car will shift left. If I "skim" the water off the rotors with light braking and try again, the car tracks a little straighter on braking. This has never happened to me before. Is this a sign of worn pads? Worn to the point where the friction coefficients are sightly different? Maybe the two front pad sets are not worn evenly?

Tire pressures are okay, although I'm on much softer/meatier winter tires (Blizzak WS60s).

Thanks for the help.

 

If my car sits overnight in the rain, I can feel/hear a little rust come off of the rotors at my first stop sign the next morning.

 

Cold wet tires is what it sounds like to me.

 

Yes, of course. This would be normal for me as well. However as soon as I back out of my driveway and move down the street. The first stop sign is a bit scary as I have to hit the brake extra hard. Never had to do this before in any weather. Only thing that has changed is the fact that my OEM pads have ~55K miles. Would this do it?

 

Sounds normal...the water will not come off the rotors till they are warmed up, then it evaporates and they stay relatively dry even in the rain.

 

doesn't sound normal to me.... how fast are you going when you approach this stop sign? how far down do you have to depress the pedal?

 

Best thing is to jack up the car and inspect the rotors and pads.

 

Funny thing is it never happened before, and I've had the car for over 2 years now driving in all sorts of weather conditions. I would think the rotors would have "warmed up" after driving in the rain on the highway at 60+mph for over 20 minutes, right? As soon as I brake for the first time, the front of the car moves to the left.

When I approach the first stop sign, I'm going maybe 8-10mph. It's within my own development. I push down normally, but it doesn't really stop the car fast enough. I have to either really press down hard, or first "skim" any residue off and then apply the brake again. The 2nd brake attempt is "normal".

I agree. It's been rainy and cold for some time now. I think I'll try to get to this this weekend. I was hoping I could wait to do my brakes until the time I swap my summer wheels/tires on. Looks like I can't.

 

Hm. Try pressing your brakes HARD before moving the car: Maybe one of your pistons is jammed? Also, check to make sure your brake booster hoses is NOT leaking and that you have brake fluid.

 

I don't know what normal is, but if i were only experiencing something like this in the rain and noticed no change in braking feel on dry roads, i would just attribute my loss in braking feel to the weather and probably wouldn't worry about it. How would you describe the change, as very subtle, subtle, noticeable, very noticeable, extremely noticeable. I would imagine that it's normal for braking distances to increase in wet roads, less friction to slow the vehicle down.

As for swerving to one side, how hard are you braking that it's scary, I'm driving around in a Land Rover that's braking in the front with only the passenger side caliper(driver side seized-to lazy to replace) and it also swerves really nastily to one side when i slam the brakes, but i wouldn't say it's scary. As you're braking is the abs kicking in as you brake? Should the VSA do something here to help keep the car straight?

I don't know, it sounds weird.