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I dont use my car that often but have noticed a weird metal grinding/skimming (quite soft not a harsh noise) noise at low speeds. I thought it was coming from the brakes but the pads and discs (although a little rusty) look okay. Could it be something to do with the wheels?

Cheers,

G

If it is under light braking, I have the same problem and under heavier braking, does your steering wheels shudder?

When I had my car serviced last, I asked the bloke to put some pad cleaner on which didn't really help, may have to try having the edges of the pads skimmed off.
Also read somewhere that the pads on Polo's don't clean themselves so the squeel/metallic sound is brake dust between the pad and disc, but don't hold me to that

i had this and volkswagen told me it was my brakes because they was 80% worn got new pads and it dosent do it now but my steering wheel also shudders heavily under heavy braking

Grapo wrote:I dont use my car that often but have noticed a weird metal grinding/skimming (quite soft not a harsh noise) noise at low speeds. I thought it was coming from the brakes but the pads and discs (although a little rusty) look okay. Could it be something to do with the wheels?
Cheers, G

If you are any good with tools, I'd just remove the pads, clean them up, clean up the callipers and clean up the edges of the discs - then use a few spots of copperease on the pads at their contact points in the calliper and re-assemble every thing, press the brake pedal to push the pads out again so that when you first brake the pedal does not go down to the floor! It could just be the pads starting to seize in the callipers, so cleaning things up would stop this, for a while.

rear calipers are a bast4rd for sticking etc id check them out!

Ok cheers guys. I think it could be the pads actually, the drivers side pad looks like its almost touching the disc. I will have a play around during the week and see if I can sort it out. Is filing the edge of the pad down a bit perfectly fine and safe?

Honestly, I can't see any reason for wanting to file down anything in there - just clean them up a bit and scrap off any rusty ridge on the discs - or tap the rusty disc area with a small hammer (use glasses). If you have looked at the pads and there is less friction material left than the thickness of the backing metal bits - then I'd replace the pads, but also check that the discs are not at their minimum service thickness. You will need a wind-back tool for the rear calliper pistons. Remember if youstart filing down the backing of the pads then they will start to get noisy as they will be a lot smaller than the space in the calliper.

Steering wheel shudder [under braking] is a symptom of front brakes being heavily worn.

Had something similar on my Mother's 9N a few months ago - pads looked fine although the discs were a bit lipped but nothing that would concern me. Took it to VW and they measured the discs and reported they were actually below minimum. Pads and discs changed, shudder all gone and car brakes true and straight once again.

Make of this what you will.

There isnt any shuddering under braking, just an odd metallic scraping noise at low speeds.