My car has 3 brakes, rear right and left and front right, that's it...
So the front right wheel on my car has been making a variety of abnormal noises the past month or so and they just recently got much more noticible and changed in tone. It feels like a branch is stuck between the tire and the car but there isn't one. I emailed my grandfather in Colorado about it who knows quite a bit about cars and he said that the brake is probably worn down and needs replaced and has some sort of spring or something (I forget just what he called it) that presses on the rotor to make a noise to let the driver know that the brakes need replaced.
I've never noticed any decrease in brake performance but maybe I'm adaptive to it and adjust to the difference and change the way I drive and never notice it. I do try to use the brakes the least I possibly can and never brake hard or anything because I want to prolong their life so maybe that's why I didn't notice any change in brake performance. Or maybe there isn't really a change in brake performance but I should think there would be considering what I noticed when I got home today.
When I got home and parked my car with the right tire in some mud but not the other tires and walked aroudn the car I noticed something. I saw that my front right tire had skidded several feet before my car came to a stop but when I was parking it I never noticed anything, it was just like it always was, I slow down and park in front of the tree as usual, nothing out of the ordinary so I don't know how the tire could have skidded like that and I not notice that it did, the car stopped exactly where I wanted it to, didn't slide further or anything.
When I saw this knowing the right tire was NOT the side making the noises and my grandfather said it could be the brakes, I decided to feel the rotors and see how hot they were and if they were the same temperature. Obviously if the brakes were working correctly then they should be the same temperature, only time one brake works more then the other is if you brake on a somewhat sharp turn and that isn't often and nor does it last very long so it shouldn't really make a noticeable difference in rotor temperature.
So I stick my hand into the front left tire expecting a very hot rotor and to pull my finger off of it very quickly as to not burn myself but when I touched it, it was just warm, only that, warm and I could leave my finger on it as long as I wanted and it wouldn't feel uncomfortably hot. I knew that this probably wasn't a good sign. Then I go and do the same to the right tire and it was pretty hot, I could not keep my finger on that rotor more then a second or two because it was so hot. At this point I knew that the front right tire must be doing nearly all of the front braking and that wasn't a good thing. Also that one just started making some very faint noises too but not like the other.
I suppose I'd better get my brakes checked out pretty quickly now because I don't want to be driving and then have them crap out on me, that would be BAD.
Well that will probably cost a nice chunk of change to get done.