pads trashed in 30k

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loaned one of my beaters out to a friend. 10k miles later they complain about low brake fluid message and horrible noise from rear. wheel off and find outside pad and rotor surface worn extra crispy.

the other side’s outside pad shows normal wear but an unusual lip at the top. the textar pads that came off are of the same type (688) but have a different clip to attach to a smaller piston and fell right out. i doubt this would cause the wear i’m seeing though.

slider bolt still has shiny coating and caliper slides freely. piston compresses easily with bleeder closed. wheel turns with no difficulty
 

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inside pad on other side also shows less wear. other rotor obviously much better
 

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Brake pads are a wear item. 30,000 miles wouldn't be anything unusual and there are so many variables like city/highway location, flat/mountain roads, aggressive/mild driving.
originals dated 96 had close to 100k on them. i don’t think they’d drive this car so hard to absolutely smoke these pads.
 
It looks like the wear is tapered :unsure:

You probably need new calipers, since the piston travel doesn't seem to be straight.
 
On something that old, I'd consider the hoses. They collapse internally and prevent the brakes from releasing fully.
for sure will consider getting them, they’re very cheap.

in my experience a collapsed hose would prevent you from compressing with the bleeder closed or at least make it difficult
 
Once I had a set of pads wear out prematurely and were worn on a bevel top to bottom. I replaced them and never had another issue with brakes on that car. I think some way I failed to get them aligned properly when I put them on causing the uneven wear. I'd never had set of pads wear like those did and haven't had since. With your pads having an area at the top that doesn't look used at all I think there was an alignment problem where they weren't sitting right in the caliper. 30K miles I'd be concerned. I bought my '02 Escort in 2008 with 80K miles and the previous owner said he'd just replace the front pads. It's now got 210K miles and when I changed the tie rods/ball joints a few weeks ago there was still approximately 1/8" of meat left on the pads. I plan to replace them this weekend if weather permits but if it doesn't I'm pretty sure they'll last me another year or two. The new pads that I bought only have about 1/4" of meat, by far the thinnest brake pads I've ever bought for any car I've owned. I'm assuming all pads for that car are the same thickness so if that's true it's been driven by my son, my wife and myself 13 years and 130K miles and only used approximately 1/8" off the brake pads. I usually get well over 100K miles out of a set of brakes in normal everyday driving. The secret to long brake life is learning to let off the gas early and coast before coming to a stop and not going straight from the gas to brake. I was riding with my daughter in law a few weeks ago and she'd be running 65 MPH until maybe 500 ft before she had to stop then slam on the brakes. I'd hate to have to keep brakes on her vehicle.
 
partially plugged line, sticky piston, or possibly something got stuck in the caliper not allowing complete release, but was dislodged at some point after wear had happened.
Or a bad set of pads or riding the brake just enough for that side to start to grab?
 
Just did a second brake pad replacement where I filed down the end tabs of the pads because it was too long for the caliper, this one the previous set of pads was worn down almost to the backing plate while the other 3 sets of pads had little wear. The other vehicle had 'sticky' brakes after the dealer replaced them, after I filed the tab the pad fit and brake operation was back to normal.
 
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