Of all the systems that make up the average car or truck, the brakes are among the most important of all. While much attention is paid to engine that create power and transmissions, wheels, and tires that deliver it, too little is paid to brake. Having properly adjusted, well-maintained brakes is one of the best ways of all of staying safe on the road, because stopping is even more important than getting moving in the first place.
The vast majority of passenger vehicles on the road today rely primarily on disc brake systems. Although most also have built-in emergency brakes of a purely mechanical sort, these are never relied upon to the extent that a car or truck’s main brakes are. Disc brakes are made of a few simple Brake Parts, each of which must be in good repair for the system as a whole to function properly.
When looking at a brake that is mounted on an axle, the single most obvious of the Brake Parts will be the rotor. The backbone of the brake, the rotor makes up the majority of its bulk. Although rotors do wear and warp over time, they tend to do so fairly slowly, meaning that the need for replacement will be somewhat infrequent.
On the other hand, brake pads need to swapped out fairly often. These vary as to how long they can be expected to last, but every set of brake pads will eventually wear down to the point that it needs to be replaced. Pads are made from relatively wear-prone materials that also happen to produce a lot of friction when they make contact with the rotor. This results in good braking performance, but it also means that the lifetime of a set of pads is necessarily limited.
Fortunately, it is never hard to find new pads for any vehicle. Because these items are designed from the start to be consumable, suppliers like Truck Parts & Equipment Inc make sure to keep reliable stocks of them. This means that those looking to refresh the performance of a set of automotive brakes often need only to make a quick trip to a local store.