Monday I was swapping some tires around on the work vans. Taking the fairly worn ones off my van and replacing the bald ones on the spare van so I could go buy tires. Force of habit made me check the front pads while the wheel was off. Probably a good thing since I'll be hauling a loaded trailer all over the state next week.
That's what 40K+ miles, stopping a 6000 pound cargo van, does to a set of Autozone Gold pads. They weren't making any noise and were stopping fine. Needless to say it got a set of pads as well as tires.
I'd say you got full use out of those.
Here's a set we pulled off one of our track cars. These are full-on track pads. After less than four sessions in a Miata, if memory serves. We decided not to add this brand to our catalog, as we figure most drivers want their brake pads to last longer than a tank of gas.
In reply to Keith Tanner:
4 sessions! 
That's a lot of pad in a short amount of time.
guess I better check my pads. almost 75k miles, original pads. seem to be working ok but I know its about time.
Toyman01 wrote:
In reply to Keith Tanner:
4 sessions! That's a lot of pad in a short amount of time.
, no kidding. We found out about it when Brandon tucked in behind me and noted the absolutely ridiculous clouds of brake dust coming off the wheels. All that pad material has to go somewhere. That particular brake setup also had really bad pad knock back so you didn't notice the pedal moving at all.
Luckily, we had others with us so we just swapped them out and called it good.
I saw a maxima (iirc) at work the other day with an empty brake res, but with no fluid leaks into the boost or out of lines/fittings/etc
customer complaint was "poor stopping"
pull the front wheels off and theres only one "pad" on the LF
I say "pad" because it was actually just the backing. The other one apparently just fell out when there was no longer any pad material there.
The piston was pushed out so far that it wouldn't go back in at all. Wouldn't even budge.
The "pad" had gouged the rotor so deeply that it ended up getting new front rotors, new LF caliper, and pads. and a flush of course.
I wonder if they were happy with their decision to put off their routine maintenance? 
corytate wrote:
I saw a maxima (iirc) at work the other day with an empty brake res, but with no fluid leaks into the boost or out of lines/fittings/etc
customer complaint was "poor stopping"
pull the front wheels off and theres only one "pad" on the LF
I say "pad" because it was actually just the backing. The other one apparently just fell out when there was no longer any pad material there.
The piston was pushed out so far that it wouldn't go back in at all. Wouldn't even budge.
The "pad" had gouged the rotor so deeply that it ended up getting new front rotors, new LF caliper, and pads. and a flush of course.
I wonder if they were happy with their decision to put off their routine maintenance?
Where I work the customer would probably try to blame us for that...
noddaz wrote:
corytate wrote:
I saw a maxima (iirc) at work the other day with an empty brake res, but with no fluid leaks into the boost or out of lines/fittings/etc
customer complaint was "poor stopping"
pull the front wheels off and theres only one "pad" on the LF
I say "pad" because it was actually just the backing. The other one apparently just fell out when there was no longer any pad material there.
The piston was pushed out so far that it wouldn't go back in at all. Wouldn't even budge.
The "pad" had gouged the rotor so deeply that it ended up getting new front rotors, new LF caliper, and pads. and a flush of course.
I wonder if they were happy with their decision to put off their routine maintenance?
Where I work the customer would probably try to blame us for that...
LOL
I can believe it though, which is the truly sad part
Jaynen
HalfDork
10/4/12 8:28 p.m.
During my broke as hell youth I bought a subaru sedan a 1982 E36 M3 brown one with rust autotragic transmission and an exhaust leak. The things rotors were so warped it ate a set of pads a week but brake work would have cost 400-500 bucks and was way more than the car. so I just put a 30 dollar set of pads in every weekend
I would say those pads do not owe you a thing.
Worst I ever saw was a lawn care truck.. not only were the pads gone.. but the pistons had eaten THROUGH the rotor to the point where the rotor broke and locked the whole wheel up.
This was on a small dump/pickup truck that often pulled a large trailer full of lawnmowers
