Parked up 7pm last night, 10am this morning noticed the discs were BROWN !!

Drove away to the top of the street and applied the brakes, they did nowt......

Slammed the hand brake on and it did stop, just......

Any ideas why the system failed?

I guess lots of brake dust between the disc and pad.

 

Hello Mcfly

Try the brown stuff is rust from the discs being wet and they will not work until your scrub them. Same applies when you wash the car, try stopping after the car has been sitting for a couple of hours.

PS I have forgotten about this a couple of times and drove the car out the garage in the morning and tried to stop before the first corner thinking oohhh sh1tttt!!!!!

 

I have had the post wash dodgy brakes, but this time they just wern't there at all.

 

they'll not fail completely just due to surface rust.

was the pedal firm? when you say did nowt, did the actually not work or did they just respond very badly?

Did they work again straightaway after you let go of the handbrake?

I've had loads of surface rust (2 weeks of no use in very wet Scottish winters) and they've never failed. The braking distance has been very much longer, but you should always assume brakes won't stop as quickly when cold and drive sensibly i.e. don't dive out your driveway, accelerate to 60mph and within 20ft of a junction expect to jump on the brakes and have the car stop instantly.