Brake Specialists in Cardiff – All Makes
We are an independent brake specialist in Cardiff and we work on all makes, not one. Brakes are the one system on a car where putting a job off is never the cheap option: a worn pad costs a set of pads, a worn pad left too long costs a set of discs as well, and a seized caliper on top of that can double the bill again. Below you can pick your make for model-specific information, or read on for what a brake job with us actually involves.
- Audi
- Skoda
- BMW
- Renault
- Citroën
- Nissan
- Fiat
- Toyota
- Vauxhall
- SEAT
- MINI
- Mitsubishi
- Land Rover
- Lexus
- Volkswagen
Signs your brakes need looking at
- A squeal that comes and goes. Often the wear indicator doing exactly its job — telling you there is a few hundred miles left, not a few thousand.
- A grinding noise. That is metal on metal. The pad material has gone and the disc is being cut. Stop driving it and call us.
- A pulsing or juddering pedal. Usually warped or unevenly worn discs, sometimes a sticking caliper that has been cooking one side.
- The car pulling to one side under braking. A seized caliper slide or a collapsed flexible hose. It is an MOT failure as well as a safety problem.
- A soft or sinking pedal. Air or moisture in the fluid, or a leak. This one is urgent.
- A handbrake that needs more travel than it used to. On a cable system, adjustment or seized rear calipers. On an electronic parking brake, a fault worth reading before it strands you.
What a brake job here involves
We take the wheels off and inspect properly rather than looking through the spokes. Pads and discs are measured against the manufacturer minimum thickness, not judged by eye. We check the caliper slides and pistons, the flexible hoses for perishing and bulging, the rigid pipes for corrosion, and the fluid for moisture content — brake fluid absorbs water from the air, and once it does its boiling point falls, which is what produces a pedal that goes soft after a long hill.
We fit discs and pads to original specification or better. Where a caliper only needs freeing off and rebuilding we will do that rather than sell you a new one, and where it genuinely needs replacing we will show you why.
Electronic parking brakes
Most cars built in the last decade have an electric motor on the rear calipers instead of a cable. Those calipers have to be wound back through the diagnostic equipment before the pads will come out, and put back into position afterwards. Forced back by hand, the motor or the gearbox inside it is damaged — and that turns a routine pad change into a new caliper. It is one of the more common jobs we end up putting right for people. We have the equipment to do it the right way on every make we service.
ABS and brake warning lights
A light on the dash is not always a worn brake. It can be a wheel speed sensor, a damaged reluctor ring, a wiring fault in a door or wheel arch loom, low fluid, or the ABS module itself. We diagnose it rather than guessing, and because we also carry out ECU repairs we can often repair an ABS module rather than replace it. There is more detail on our ABS and brake repairs page.
Brakes and the MOT
Brakes are one of the biggest single causes of MOT failure, and most of it is avoidable: imbalance across an axle, corroded pipes, a binding caliper, or a handbrake that will not hold. We MOT test on site, so if something fails we can quote it there and then — and you are free to take the repair elsewhere.
Book your brakes in
Brake service from £100. Call 02920 220 380 or contact us and we will tell you what your car needs and what it will cost before we start.
Contact A1 Diagnostics
Get in touch today for expert advice we are here to help with any brake problems you might be experiencing when out on the road.