Thread: lack of rear brake pad wear

first a little background. i bought the car new the summer of '97. 2 or 3 yrs later @~50k-60k i put ad22ve brakes up front. flash forward to the here and now. the car has 217k and it still has the original rear brakes. i mean the pad material is still 90% there! its like they aren't being used at all with the foot brake. in fact, driving down the road at 20mph for instance, pull up on the e-brake and the car slowly rolls to a stop. my 2007 frontier on the other hand will lock up the rear tires easily with the e-brake.
So, do i need to replace the master cylinder with an altima 1 for more rear brake bias, replace/rebuild the rear calipers and replace the pads or what??

The park brake isn't necessarily designed to stop the car, but it will do the job semi-effectively. You can adjust the park brake cable tension, but remember to keep it fairly slack when the lever is down (disengaged). You don't want to drag the rear brakes while driving. As far as brake wear, I'm still on my original rear pads after 160k miles ('98 SE-R). I'm about to change them, since they're pretty low now.

If you're concerned about whether the rears are working, jack the rear of the car up and spin the tires by hand. Then have a friend step on the pedal and see if they stop immediately. The rear brakes aren't the most powerful and don't do much on our cars. Adding too much rear brake may make the car unstable when stopping, and may lock the rear tires in a panic stop.

Comparatively, a Frontier has huge brakes versus your SE-R.

I need to adjust my rear cable, it is out of FSM specs, just have not got around to doing so because of all the damn snow!!!

I think its the AD22s up front. My car is the same situation the rear brakes are cool to the touch after driving.....

The car stops fine so I'm not worried about it.

The rear brakes never do much on these cars. It does sound like maybe your calipers are sticking a bit though, or maybe there's air in the rear brake lines. You could do an overhaul of the rear brakes or just leave them like they are.

I'll say once I got my rear brakes working and working hard (Altima MC make all the difference) my braking distances shortened quite a bit.

True to what Ben said /\ . I would start by taking apart the rear brakes and inspect the slide bolts to make sure they move freely and grease them then make sure the brake pads aren't frozen in the braket if so you will end up with uneven pad and rotor ware due to the pad not making contact with the rotor .Alittle sanding of the tabs or ears on the pads will fix this .Also be sure to grease these too . I would also make sure the piston turns in and out and then do a bleed . My rear driver side inner pad was frozen complelty in the braket and caused the inside of the rotor to rust and pitted . Also make sure the pads are worn flush and flat against the rotor and not groved as this will affect brake performance .As far as the ebrake it never locks up the tires but it should hold while parking at a minimum of seven clicks and 1200 rpm as some states require for safety testing if not a 10mm sockett and a extension will fix that . Oh and my set up is Altima m/c with ad22's with axis pads with fast brakes 11.8 slotted and dimpled rotors and stainless lines . The rears are stock .

same here

I have an NX and my rears dont wear out either. Its normal. Our rear brakes arent used much. Do this...wash the car and let the rotors rust up on the face. Mine rust in about the time it takes to finish drying the car. Then drive the car. If the rear rust goes away after about 2 minutes of driving and braking then your good. No need to start taking apart stuff.