"Service wear on Brakepads" warning in red.

A bit if advice pls... My car has started showing the above msg as soon as I got it back home from a visit to a specialist who did some work on the discs and suspension struts last month. There is plenty of brake pad meat still left. The msg comes up every 3rd or 4th time I drive the car, and goes away if I stope and restart the car. I called the specialist on the way back home from them and they agreed to look at it again next day. They then told me on inspection the following day that the pads on my car were non oem, (red or yellow colour I think they said )and there was no place to connect the sensor and hence I was getting the error. The msg had never come up on the car before taking to the specialist. Are they right, or do you think I should demand they resolve as it is clearly in the area they were working on, and perhaps they broke something? Obviously I don't want to start the conversation if it's unlikely that they had nothing to do with starting this error. Perhaps the sensors Re prone to damage :dont know:

I bought some oem pads (texstar) for my turbo and they had the slots in for the sensors but they were not quite the correct size and my sensor were old and crumbled when I tried to fit them. I decided to defeat the warning by cutting the sensor wires and soldering the ends together and I just keep an eye on the pads myself which is easy as they are easy to see through the spokes. I find the warning system a nuisance anyway as you get the alarm while there is still plenty of meat on the pads and I like to run them until they're a bit lower otherwise it's just a waste of money. Perhaps you could ask them to cut and solder the wires? Mac

The sensors can throw a light if there is water in them or that are cracked. I melted mine from getting the brake so hot on road trips and it threw a light a few times but in the end I just looped the sensors back on themselves as it's easy to see the pads through the wheels anyway. I've never bought aftermarket pads that don't have the slots for the sensors, even though I don't use sensors they have come with the slots.

Just to be clear; if your car doesn't have slots for the sensors in the pads, you can't expect the garage to fit sensors. Get yourself on ebay and buy a set of Textar pads and new sensors and then pass them to the garage for fitting.

Thanks guys. The car had never thrown this error until the drive back from the specialist(who were doing work with the brake discs and front struts), My logic would say they caused the break or didn't put the wires back correctly, but perhaps there is some cost to rectify :?:

They may have seen the sensors hanging (if whoever put the last pads in, didn't secure them) and simply removed them. This would leave the circuit open and trigger the warning light. As others have said, the trick is to snip and solder the leads together to disable them 100%.

Ok thanks. I'll double check with them

Sounds to me like they were not fitted to the pads so were more than likely tie wrapped to the strut and were probably disturbed during the work. The sensor are only cheap and they age so it's quite possible that moving them out of the way then putting them back as they were may have caused then to deteriorate to point that water can get in them causing the lamp. Seeing as they are only a tenner each and a consumable part I don't see it as a big deal. It would be interesting to see if your current pads do in fact have the holes to fit them, in which case you could get new ones fitted. Remember they are consumable parts ie when the pads get low they get worn down exposing the wires in side and will then need to be replaced. If yours are really old then i have sympathy for the garage.

Ps if the specialist just removed them you'd have had the lamp constantly not intermittently!

:thumb: :thumb: