What is the most important feature on a car? Top speed? 0-60mph times? Or the aesthetic? Perhaps the badge on the front? Or reliability – can you get the school run finished and get to work without worrying?!
All of these are important, and make a big impact on our decisions about buying cars. Once the car is purchased, though, perhaps one of the most important aspects to any vehicle are the brakes! Agreed, they’re not a glamorous feature, but they’ve got to be up there on the list of important parts to keep working safely and smoothly.
That was the view of one Nissan Qashqai owner who recently brought their car into our team at A1 Diagnostics for an overhaul on the brake system. Here is the car pictured below:
There are more component parts to brakes than you might imagine, so our expert mechanics carefully addressed each area to make sure the end result met the highest safety standards.
We began with the brake pads, which were replaced at the rear with top-quality new pads. Brake pads can be made of a number of different substances, including organic materials like rubber or glass, metallics like iron or copper, ceramic compounds or fused metals. On a Nissan Qashqai, pads are generally either metallic or ceramic materials, backed by a steel plate. These pads press against the brake rotas when you want to stop the car, with the pressure causing the rotas to slow and reduce the car’s speed.
But how do the pads get pushed against the rotas? An excellent question. The answer is callipers, and our top-notch mechanics made sure these were also carefully checked as part of the overhaul. Callipers use hydraulic pressure to force the brake pads onto the spinning rotas and begin the slow-down process. While they’re typically very durable, making sure they’re working optimally will support the safe running of your brakes and ensure other remedial work – like replacing brake pads – isn’t undermined by wider issues.
Taking a belt-and-braces approach to our overhaul, we additionally replaced the brake discs on the Qashqai, making sure the whole brake system was in top condition at the end of the session. Once this was complete, the owner could drive away in full confidence of a high-quality service from A1 Diagnostics.
A1-Diagnostics and ECU Repairs
64 Sloper Road
Leckwith,
Cardiff
CF11 8AB
Tel: 02920 220 380
Opening Times
Mon – Fri: 8:00am – 6:00pm
Email: info@a1-diagnostics.com