95 Civic CX hatchback, stock brakes. Just bought and installed new front rotors and pads because there were 2-3 really deep grooves in my drivers side rotor. When I was changing them I made sure to clean all the surfaces of any dust/debris prior to completing the installation. I just went out to break them in and come back and now my drivers side rotor is doing the same thing, two clear grooves while the passenger side is flush how it should be, there's no rocks or anything between my drivers side brake pad and rotor. The caliper seemed to decompress fine when installing the new pads, and I bled the brakes properly after the install. What could be causing this?

edit- may be unrelated, but I've noticed lately that I can hear a slight whining noise from my drivers side while im driving with my window down, it goes away if I'm accelerating or braking but if I'm at a constant speed or decelerating without using my brakes I hear it. Also about the same time I started hearing that I started hearing what sounds like my tire rubbing on my fender well when making even the slightest right turn, but I've looked it over and can't see it touching any part of the vehicle.

 

Sounds like a bad wheel bearing....

 

Can you post pictures of the grooves? Are they concentric circles or just all over the place?

 

Could be a bad bearing, warped rotor due to over tightening the wheel lugs, or you bought the cheapest rotors. If you have limited funds buy the good rotors and cheap pads. Pads are much cheaper to replace.

 

Any way to check if the wheel bearing is bad?

I might agree with the warped rotor, but it happened the same way on my old rotor which is why I replaced it and I even torqued the lug nuts to spec just to be sure. I was doing some reading and I guess it can happen from a bad master cylinder, but if my master cylinder was bad wouldn't it do it to both rotors? Then I thought it could be my caliper, but if it was my caliper wouldn't it do it to the inside and outside of the rotor, not just the outside? I noticed that the caliper piston isn't retracting as it should when I let off the brakes but it isn't staying fully engaged either, would that be a bad caliper? master cylinder? brake lines?

 

The grooves in it now aren't nearly as bad as before, when I figure out the problem should I replace that side rotor and pads again or will it even itself out?

 

Well I'm going to go pick up a new caliper, hopefully that solves the issue.

 

Bad wheel bearings are easy to diagnose. Jack up the front end, and grab the wheel. Try to wiggle it left and right, as well as up and down. If it wiggles noticeably left and right but not up and down, check your tie rods. If it wiggles noticeably up and down but not left and right, check your ball joints. If it wiggles both ways, check your tie rods and ball joints, and if they're fine, it's probably your wheel hub bearing.

 

check to see if the shims in the caliper that hold the pads in are rubbing the rotor. that happened to my car once.

 

The wheel doesn't wiggle.

I took a bright light and checked from every angle for a good 10-15 minutes and the only thing making any contact with the rotor is the brake pad.

I tried cleaning and regreasing the caliper sliders and they go in and out perfectly with no resistance, when that didn't solve it I changed out my brake caliper for a known working one but that didn't fix it either. I know my master cylinder is good, I have no pinches anywhere in my brake lines.. I'm at a loss and so is everyone I've asked about the issue... Any ideas HT?

 

have you removed the pad? Pull it out and take a good look at it.

 

Multiple times, at the top of the front pad it's making the same marks as it is in the rotor, almost like something was caught in there but it's perfectly clean.

 

There could have been something there, that may be gone now.

 

No, it's still doing it. Did it with my old rotors and pads as well.

 

Defective pads?

 

It seems piston is partially stuck. It could have rusted on one side of cylinder and the other is free causing the piston to move out unevenly. Try pushing in the piston to its cylinder and back out again. See how much resistance you have. Or while you're into it, do some cleaning on the caliper internals.