I've been registered here for a pretty long time, I read everyone's threads, absorb some knowledge, and have never had anything to say. I thought I would take this opportunity to uh, rant a little. Unless I'm in the wrong here..

My '06 tC that just hit 40k miles needed new brake pads. I was very aware of this. I went out and bought new ones and just didn't have the time to put them on. Now, I noticed that when I hit about 40 mph i would get this strange sound out of my passenger side front wheel. whirwhirwhirwhirwhirwhir... haha.. It would go faster when I sped up and slower when I slowed down. Another thing I noticed was that when I let off the accelerator my car would slow down SIGNIFICANTLY. Almost to a stop. I realized this is not from the fact that I needed new brake pads.
I take it into my dealer.
My caliper has been squeezing my brake ALL THE TIME. It was always braking. Warranty work!!! Yay! My baby can be fixed and all healthy again and it won't cost me anything! Not the case... The $400 some odd dollar caliper is 100% covered BUT I need new brake pads, two new rotors, and all the labor yada yada. My total would have been $480.
Now, the way this made sense in my mind was that since the brake caliper was locked and was constantly squeezing my rotor which caused it to warp and caused my pads to get worn down faster... Wouldn't that ALSO be covered?

I asked them if they could just put the brake pads and the new rotor that I bought on that I supplied since they already had everything off the car anyway.. Couldn't do that because It wouldn't be covered under warranty. I understood. They were going to put the old brake pads on. I know for a fact there was nothing left on them, especially the passenger side one. Not too safe!
I planned on taking it to a friend of mine that would put everything on for me and only wanted $40 for it and I informed the man at the service desk. He bent a little and said that he could put the ONE brake pad on and would only charge me half the labor for it. If not, I would have had to sign the waiver saying that I knew that the car was unsafe when I drove it out of there. Well we can't have that now can we? I said fine, go ahead. Then I took it to my friend to put the new rotor on the passenger side and the other brake pad on the driver's side.

Did I handle this the wrong way? After this whole situation, I jumped on SL and read about people calling into Scion themselves to have a representative come to their house to inspect the "rattle" that haunts us all (which I'm about to harass my dealer about just to spite them).

 

the whole thing should have been covered. if the caliper seized on you then it should cover the caliper, pads and rotor because they where all damaged due to the caliper freezing.

 

Is this the first time that you've had your brakes replaced?

 

Yeah it is. And I have an automatic. I drive it pretty hard from time to time too.

 

I would have made them replace the rotor and pad under warranty since the faulty caliper was the cause of that needing be replaced.

 

im with u on that. im not trying to side against you, but they dont really know if the brakes were like that before they seized, some ppl do ride their brakes n replace them well before 40k miles

 

yeah but people don't need to change rotors at 40k normally. I see your point for the pads but I think they should have done something about the rotor even if it was half and half.