Need auto shop to replace brake pads and rotor

[My525i]

Hi,

I am a new member of this forum.

I am looking to replace my 525i's brake pads and rotor with Hawk HPS pads and Brembo rotor. I called 4 auto shops and no one is willing to install for me.

Anyone has a clue which auto shop will do it, or if you know any auto shops in Katy or Houston TX will do it?

Many thanks

My 525i

[BimmerE39]

Pretty much an decent shop can do it for you. I'm assuming you have a BBK if you're installing Brembo rotors. I don't see why four shops would turn you down to do a relatively simple job. My suggestion would be to find a shop that specializes in performance.

[My525i]

Hi BimmerE39,

Thank you very much for the reply. A couple of questions:

-What is BBK? If I don't have it any suggestion as to other brand name's rotor? I choose Brembo based on my research online, and price is reasonable. I mean the plain one Brembo, not the slotted one which is too expensive.
-Your car E39 looks like mine in terms of look. Is E39 a high performance 525 version? I am still learning more about BMW.

Those 4 shops said the same thing. They can't make money on the labor. They want to me to use their parts and labor, but the parts they offer are only OE or OEM, and they charge a lot even for OEM parts.

Thanks.

[BimmerE39]

BBK is an abbreviation for big brake kit. When you mentioned Brembo rotors I assumed you might have one. Now worries though.

I can see why a shop doesn't seem to think that they can't make money off of the labor but you could always say you'll pay them in cash. See if that makes a difference. Brake jobs are typically pretty easy and don't require a lot of work.

E39 is the chassis designation for the 5-series that was built between 1995-2003. BMW doesn't use platforms like other manufacturers, instead each generation has a development (Entwicklung) code.

So for the 5-series...
E12 (1972-1981)
E28 (1982-1988)
E34 (1988-1996)
E39 (1995-2003)
E60/61 (2003-present)
F10 (2010-???)

Mercedes has a similar system to name their platforms and it's pretty typical among the German auto manufacturers to do this. It helps differentiate models based on chassis name instead of year and model.