2.0T Are these worn brake pads? Scammed or not?

[SFM]

I went for my 40k km (25k miles) service a couple of days ago and I told them to check the brakes just in case. They told me all rear and front pads needed replacement and rotors needed skimming. They were the original pads. I told them to replace the pads and skim the rotors as they suggested.

I asked them to keep the old pads for me to look at and I’m going to add pictures of the front pads only. They’re looking weird as for the front brakes it’s 4 pads? Anyway 2 of those front pads looked thick and 2 of them looked worn. I didn’t take a picture of the rear pads because they all looked worn. The pads + skimming + labour cost me around US$320.

 

[BlueGT]

The rule of thumb is when the material is as thick as the backing plate they should be changed. its a concern only one pad in the picture looks worn. This in normally an indication of tight Caliper slides causing the pad to drag and wear prematurely.Also it’s a bit unusual to see 2 different slot patterns in the pad material. Are you sure they are all your pads? Has anyone else got a set of OE pads? Do inner and outer pads vary with vertical and diagonal slots?

 

[SFM]

The rule of thumb is when the material is as thick as the backing plate they should be changed. its a concern only one pad in the picture looks worn. This in normally an indication of tight Caliper slides causing the pad to drag and wear prematurely.Also it’s a bit unusual to see 2 different slot patterns in the pad material. Are you sure they are all your pads? Has anyone else got a set of OE pads? Do inner and outer pads vary with vertical and diagonal slots?

Im not sure if they vary with the slots but when I told them to keep all my old pads, I saw 4 pads for the front with two different slot types. One slot type is worn more than the other slot type. I didn’t take a picture of the rear brake pads but they are not slotted and all of them are worn the same level for all pads.

 

[friss]

I recently changed my OEM pads after 16k miles and 2 track days and I had a similar wear pattern where 1 of each side of the fronts had worn down further than the other (a noticeable to the eye amount but not as much as here)

 

[oddball]

That level of difference - if the pads were on the same wheel - is a sure sign of a problem.
Note that our Brembo brakes are fixed calipers, so we don't have the sticking/seized caliper slide issue. An OEM fixed caliper with uneven wear means something has gone terribly wrong.

This makes me wonder if maybe one of the front brake pad sets (left *or* right) were changed recently, and the other set wasn't. Especially with the different slot designs, it seems like this must have happened somehow/somewhere.

 

[SFM]

That level of difference - if the pads were on the same wheel - is a sure sign of a problem.
Note that our Brembo brakes are fixed calipers, so we don't have the sticking/seized caliper slide issue. An OEM fixed caliper with uneven wear means something has gone terribly wrong.

This makes me wonder if maybe one of the front brake pad sets (left *or* right) were changed recently, and the other set wasn't. Especially with the different slot designs, it seems like this must have happened somehow/somewhere.

This is the first time I change the pads. My guess is it wasn’t installed properly from factory? Also the brakes on the 2.0T are different than the Brembos.

 

[oddball]

Ah, right. 2.0 uses more typical floating calipers. On those, one worn pad and one non-worn pad means the "floating" part of the caliper isn't working correctly. Pretty common after 5 to 10 years if the brakes haven't been properly maintained, but again very unusual on a new car. Or, if the person doing the brake job is an idiot and reinstalls the pins dry (which I did on my wife's car .... 20 years ago?)

Has the car ever been in the dealer's hands or at any garage? Service or anything? I'm thinking a tech might have swapped out one set of pads for who-knows-what reason. Sometimes they do something stupid and just try to cover their tracks.

 

[SFM]

Ah, right. 2.0 uses more typical floating calipers. On those, one worn pad and one non-worn pad means the "floating" part of the caliper isn't working correctly. Pretty common after 5 to 10 years if the brakes haven't been properly maintained, but again very unusual on a new car. Or, if the person doing the brake job is an idiot and reinstalls the pins dry (which I did on my wife's car .... 20 years ago?)

Has the car ever been in the dealer's hands or at any garage? Service or anything? I'm thinking a tech might have swapped out one set of pads for who-knows-what reason. Sometimes they do something stupid and just try to cover their tracks.

This is the 4th service I do with them and I haven’t taken it to any garage except for Kia’s service centre.