Anyone know why our brakes don't last?
 

Anyone know why our brake doesn't last? I love the braking power on our G but the life spend of the brake is just as ridiculas as my ML500 which is almost 5000 lb. Both last about 15,000 ~ 25,000 miles depends on how much local driving I have done.

I don't know anything about brakes and its was never a concern for me until now that both of my cars are brake eating machines. My last 2 cars prior to these 2 were a BMW 530i and Honda Prelude Type-SH. The brake on my 530i last 50,000 miles and my honda never needed replacement even when I sold the car at 72,000 miles. So, you can kind of understand where I'm coming from.

Brake experts, please shade some light into this, thanks.

You can redesign the brake system in any way you like too increase stopping distances.
OEM pads are very very very soft and fast wearing to minimize the friction ramp up time, by getting high friction fast [in the first 1/2 second] they reduce braking distances by 10 feet or so vs a harder longer lasting pad composition.

When you are traveling 88 feet per second every 0.1 sec counts = 8.8 feet 1g= 32 ft/sec/sec deceleration .........3 seconds or better can be achieved.

What Q45tech said! Basically, you pay for performance.

If longevity is your main concern, go for harder material pads when you replace. You won't stop as quickly but your pads will last longer. Its all a trade off...

I thought it also had something to do with the fact that the 03/04 brake's were just designed too small for the car?

Mostly the fact that the pad material is soft cold to avoid any lost time heating it up before friction rises.

Oem manufacturers must design pads that work under very cold [first stop of the day] conditions unlike track/performance pads which can have serious stopping weakness until they warm up beyond 100F [some don't work until 200F].

When you try to beat the best for magazine test you must use every trick in the book..........thus soft fast wearing pads.

To correctly select a new/different pad material you must find a friction [Mu] vs temperature chart and a friction vs sliding speed chart [graph].

You also need a graph of the friction vs pressure as this varies with composition. How much brake pedal pressure creates what friction.

Beware of low quality and low priced brake linings. This is not the place to attempt to save money and buy the lowest cost linings. Your vehicles braking performance and safety depend on them and they must function flawlessly and stop the vehicle effectively under all conditions. It is also important to note that although OEM supplied and installed brake linings must conform to strict FMVSS safety standards, aftermarket linings are not required to meet these specifications

I have an "03 with Brembo...the mileage is 34K with 40% left

That's pretty unbelievable... You must go really easy on your brakes.

You have 9mm of pad thickness, how many applications per mile and how long with what pedal pressure at what ambient temperature and deceleration rate..........Obviously different styles and locations result in different wear per mile.

Pads can go in 15,000 miles or 40,000 miles depending on driver.

When people say my pads lasted 20,000 miles what does that mean without details.

Probably easier to change driving style than to experiment with pad materials.