Posted on 1/30/2026
A grinding noise when braking has a way of grabbing your attention fast. It can start as a faint scrape you only notice with the radio off, then turn into a sound you cannot ignore at the next stoplight. The challenge is that grinding can come from a few different brake problems, and the right fix depends on what is actually making contact. If you track when the noise happens and what the brake pedal feels like, you can usually narrow it down before small wear turns into bigger damage. What Grinding Brakes Usually Means Grinding is almost always friction between parts that were not meant to rub together. Sometimes that is brake pads worn down far enough that metal touches the rotor. Other times it is rust scale, a backing plate brushing the rotor, or a caliper issue that keeps a pad dragging. The sound can be consistent or it can come and go, which is why people second-guess it. Even if it disappears for a day, the underlying cause usually does not disappear. It is ... read more