How are you cleaning? I wash my cyclocross bike with discs very frequently, either every race or every other race and I never have problems. My procedure: Wet the whole bike with the hose, use a soft brush with dish soap to clean the frame, saddle, rims/tires and drivetrain. I try NOT to spray the discs and calipers to avoid putting crap onto the disc or pads. Then clean/lube drive chain as usual. Let air dry.

It's important with discs not to contaminate the rotor or the pads on the caliper. This will make your brakes suck and potentially ruin your pads requiring replacement.

Hope this helps

Edit:

So I pulled them apart for the first time, and after just a few months of riding the pads are completely screwed. With rim brakes you'd get some warning, but them's the breaks.

Recommendation for some quality pads?

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'It never gets easier, you just get crazier.'

what brakes?
4 years of commuting on shimano discs and no problems with their resin road pads, bike cleaned regularly, sometimes (rarely) i'll give the rotors a little tlc with some 400 grit and alcohol, but mostly not.
I've put swissstop pads into Formula mtb calipers to quiet down howling for people before now, and no complaints.

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'to give anything less than the best is to sacrifice the gift'...Pre

Swissstop and jag wire both made good disc brake pads.

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"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."
Hunter S. Thompson

And so it begins...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

Get off my lawn!

I remember when bikes cost a nickel! A nickel!

Was in Kentucky for CX PanAms this weekend. It was nice and muddy for most of the weekend.
We had 11 junior riders plus 2 coaches. 2 bikes apiece = 26 bikes + 3 u23 Riders & friends During Races that I washed throughout the weekend.

Doing some quick math it was ~ 200 bike washes in 2.5 days.

During racing was just a power-washer blasting (~80 washes)
After pre-rides / pre-race prep was Rinse, Dish-soap brush wash, rinse, dry.

I typically do not like to dish-soap wash entire bikes, but in these conditions, this volume of bikes and this time-frame it's what works best. At home I tend to Simple-green spray selective areas.

If you do contaminate pads / rotors it's a pretty easy fix.

Put some ~80 grit sand paper on a table and rub the pads in circular fashion for ~ 10 seconds. Gets ride of the build up.
Wipe Rotors with alcohol wipes.
After this you'll need to re-bed the pads in which takes ~ 1 minute.
Whole process should be about 4 minutes and your brakes will work like new.

With that said, even rim pads and brakes need TLC. Just because you can neglect something doesn't mean it's better nor that you should.

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The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
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Really? I am 100% disc at this point.
I would say that cleaning is easier on my disc bikes than it was on my rim brake bikes.

Here is my cleaning method for all bikes-
1.) Spray bike with water if full of grit- usually before it dries if possible.
2.) Spray cassette, chainrings, and chain with degreaser. I used something called Mudshine- It does not corrode aluminum parts.
3.) Fill a bucket with warm water and dawn detergent while the degreaser sits a bit.
4.) Fill Park chain cleaner with the soapy water- run chain through and refill 3x.
5.) Scrub off cassette with a small brush.
6.) scrub crap off my pulleys.
7.) Brush gunk off chaninrings- front and back.
8.) Lightly hose off drivetrain.
9.) Starting from back side of drive side- clean frame and parts working forward with soapy sponge.
When I get to front wheel- squeeze out some soapy water on brake caliper and rotor-
Wipe rotor with soapy sponge-
Work back on non-drive side-
Do same to rear brake when I get there-
10.) Hose off bike-

Takes me less than 10 minutes to do all that- Bike works perfectly afterwards

I usually let the water dry off before I add lube and hang up-

looks like you solved your problem.

the only thing that will contaminate discs that people use as part of the washing process is that spray on shine in a can, and lube. Keep those two things away from rotors and pads and you're fine.

If it is your commuter, you may be getting a particularly toxic mess if you are in an urban area - the road spray can have oils and other suspect chemicals in it. In that case you can follow the guidance above with the sandpaper to deglaze the surface of the pads and wipe the rotors with alcohol.

If it is not slimy road spray - as everyone has said cleaning with soap and water in a normal bike wash usually is not an issue and you have somehow got lube or other contaminant on the pads.


Since it sounds like you'll be replacing your pads, one of the tricks that is useful is to mix a semi-metallic pad with an organic one. Buy one set of each, then install a mixed pair front and rear. That will give great bite and durability ( from the metallic) and minimize brake squeal with the softer organic pad.

good luck

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" I take my gear out of my car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of of their lives shocks me. "
(opening lines from Tim Krabbe's The Rider , 1978

That is just stupid as differing wear rates will lead to one piston coming far out of the caliper and one not.
The one too far will then be vulnerable to vibration, sticking and leaks.

Quick - go tell everyone riding their bikes with this setup. There are only a few million of us!

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" I take my gear out of my car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of of their lives shocks me. "
(opening lines from Tim Krabbe's The Rider , 1978

I use a factory level degreaser and car shampoo on a disc road bike. I can be 100% sure that there'no potent harm to your brake system.
Just becarefull with oil-ish things

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Stay home, stay healthy.

Disc brakes = better breaking = faster pad wear. Every benefit has tradeoffs.