Brake dust mess

[zafarius]

I have just started to notice that I am getting a lot of what seems
to be "liquid brake dust" or brake dust mixed with water all over the front and sides of my E300. This is the first time I've seen this in 5 years. I'm not talking about just a bit of dust on the wheels but on the windscreen, bonnet , wings etc. I'm doing a lot of motorway driving and consequently a lot of heavy braking and would expect to see dust around the wheels.


Has anyone else seen this phenomena.

 

[lookskyward1]

Motorway driving = hard braking, I dont think so. If you have to brake hard and often on a motorway you need to change your driving style.

As for your problem, I would think that if it is brake dust you may have a sticking brake caliper. Strip the brakes, check the pads they should wear evenly, clean them up. Check the sliders and pistons on the calipers are working freely then re-build with copper grease on the pad backs.

 

[DrNick]

Sounds like its just crap off the road! I have to clean my headlights every day at the moment, and the cloth comes away black. (I go up and down the M3 every day.)
If the muck is in front or above the front wheels (ie windscreen, headlights, bonnet etc then its not coming from your brakes!

Nick

Motorway driving = hard braking, I dont think so. If you have to brake hard and often on a motorway you need to change your driving style.

As for your problem, I would think that if it is brake dust you may have a sticking brake caliper. Strip the brakes, check the pads they should wear evenly, clean them up. Check the sliders and pistons on the calipers are working freely then re-build with copper grease on the pad backs.

 

[Shude]

If the muck is in front or above the front wheels (ie windscreen, headlights, bonnet etc then its not coming from your brakes!

Yeah that would be from the brakes of the vehicle in front

 

[DITTRICH]

...I took little tyke William up to the NEC in Birmingham to see the Model train Exhibition and by the time we got back to London the car was just so...dirty. Its all crap off the motorways which are very very dirty - especially if you spend time behind an HGV in slow traffic just after its been raining.
Les

 

[JohnC]

It will be mainly rubber - we've not had heavy rain for some time that would wash away the rubber we all leave on the road. When it's damp from fog etc then the spray from the car in front is mainly a suspension of rubber in water.

 

[zafarius]

Yea, I noticed a lot of this stuff on other cars this morning where I work.

It seems to be related to whatever is being put on the roads or as you say "rubber" from tyres . By the time I got to work and parked up, this black stuff was dripping off the insides of the wheelarches and onto the ground. This was also happening to other cars as well.