Is soft braking primarily a problem with particular pads or is it a bit more complicated than that? Every car I drive brakes a lot harder than my MAX. My mom's acccord, my old civic, my dad's camry, and those are just regular old cars. Im not even going to compare it to driving a 350z or Prelude. The brakes just dont bite hard, the braking feels luxrious instead of efficient. And it seems like there is brake fade after hard braking as well. The rotors in the front are pretty much brand new, but the backs are older. I dont know what pads are on there, the previous owner put them on. Will this problem go away with better pads?

 

Could be a weak master cylinder to glazed pads. I would start with the pads first.

 

Is there any air in the system? maybe try bleeding the brakes and top off any needed brake fluid.

 

The maxima does have a softer pedal feel then other cars...i don't know why, but that how it is....what i suggest you is what buzpuck11 said, flush, bleed and top off...you can you a higher temp boiling point oil...example instead of DOT 3, u can use DOT 4 or 5...from there the braking should be optimal...look at your calipers aswell, make sure they don't leak and the back ones are known to seize so check all those things and from there you will have the best OEM braking power. I don't think the master cylinder might be defective...eitherway, if you drive this car like a race car, it won't hold up(brakes wise) and would have to use bigger brakes...i just might go to q45 calipers and discs but not more then that...Use good pads...i use Monroe which I like cause they come with the shims and a 3yr warrenty or 60000kms and are regular price. I also heard that powerslot rotor are really good and if u use the Hawk pads with it it will have more bite...something like a civic, really sensitive and easy to lock up kinda thing, but the stock ones are OK

ohh one thing i forgot, check the guide pins on the caliper bracket, sometimes they are seized and will not make the car brake well and will kill the pads and/or rotors

 

Its a maxima thing haha, I did Morse HP pads and it definitely improved braking.. But, if you're thinking the same thing as I do when I tap the brakes, then you need to get bigger rotors and calipers because no matter what stock is always gonna be lame.

 

yeah i believe it is just the car also, I needed to replace and front two calipers, new name brand pads all around (i forget what's on there) and new rotors on all four. I still have the soft braking problem.

 

I agree I had the same problem in the summer after i changed my brake pads. Try Bleeding them.

 

Do not put DOT5 in your brake system!

 

are you going to explain why? Or just leave him to guess?

 

dot 5 is fine BUT you have to completely flush out all of the dot3 first. unlike dot4 and dot 5.1 you can not mix dot 5 with dot 3. If i remember right, solidification may occur.

 

Our cars use ONLY DOT 3 brake fluid. could be a costly and dearly price to pay for putting dot 4 or 5 in your car.

use dot 3, do a full bleed, and quality pads, and SS lines, should firm everything up.

 

care to explain why we cant use dot 4 or dot 5.1? (dot 5 being silicone based would be a problem with contamination)

 

I dont know the techincal chemical explination of why our cars should only be used dot 3, but when I see if every service manual and FSM for the maxima I've read in state "use only DOT 3 approved brake fluid." If you want go ahead and use DOT 4 or DOT 5, its your car.

 

DOT 4 will work in our cars and DOT 5.1 is completely unnecessary (for race cars and semi trucks... etc.) DOT 5 is silicone based and can supoosedly eat away at seals in the brake system, and also does not mix with the other brake fluid (which, no matter how much you flush will never completely leave the system).

 

get your rotors resurfaced, get new pads (hawk hps are a great pad) replace lines with stainless steel braided lines. and if thats still not enough for you up it to a big brake kit. yes DOT3 will work just fine unless you plan on racing the twelve hours of sebring lol.

 

I agree with the "full bleed" idea. My car has regular ceramic pads and normal rotors, yet its pedal feel is the most reassuring of any car I've driven (all "regular"), but this only happened after the full bleed. I should caution that I had sears do a bleed but they only tried to remove the air; I should've asked for a flush if I wanted a complete fluid change.

I use Valvoline "synthetic" DOT 5.1; the one in the gold bottle. At Advance, it's like ~6 for the quart, which is only a couple of bucks more than the house brand. The improved dry braking performance of 5.1 vs. 4 vs 3 isn't important, but I think the wet improvement is worth it.

 

Thats probably because they didn't know about dot4 back then. It also saids use only platinum plugs... we know iridium is better in everyway

 

i think you need to bleed your lines...that's the biggest reason for the soft feeling....

 

I agree Iridium > platinum anyday..

 

But you can't completely flush out the original fluid. Never mix DOT 5 in with any other kind of brake fluid. Besides, a good quality DOT4 is as good as a DOT 5. There is simply NO REASON to need to mix them.

As for the original question, soft brakes can be caused by many things: aging brake lines that aren't as stiff as when they were new, less-than-perfect seals in the master cylinder and brake calipers, old water-logged brake fluid with air bubbles in it. The bottom line is that newer cars have more touchy brake pedals, and older cars have softer pedals unless someone did a complete brake system overhaul. My thoughts are that for a car like this, it's worth fixing what is truly going bad, but if you chase around a somewhat soft pedal you may never fix it without dumping a load of money.

Dave

 

Thanks for all the advice guys!

 

I do advocate bleeding the brakes. One of the best fluids you can get is ATE superblue.

Dave

 

Is brake fluid supposed to be amber color after flushing? I went to econo lube n tube to do a master cylinder flush and the fluid is still amber looking. Braking didn't change either. LOL they used this cheap looking jhonsons dot 3 braking fluid. Did I get the wrong service done or something?

 

It's usually a golden color.

As long as they used an unopened can of fluid, it's good. Brake fluid isn't high tech stuff. It just doesn't perform as well as it gets older and absorbs water. It is a good safety/maintenance thing to do.

Not surprising though that the pedal didn't change. Unless the fluid had a lot of air in it, you won't feel that much during regular driving.

Dave