At 30,000 km our front brakes started making a grinding noise. I was surprised as we have NEVER changed brakes this fast on any car in the last 15 years! I took the brakes out myself and found that the rotor on the rear side was rusted with grooves and rear pad also had grooves. There was plenty of friction material left, and a lot of the friction material was building up on the sides of the pads and covered the caliper bracket. Note: this car does not have a lot of mileage yet but is driven everyday.

There might be a combination of problems here, too soon to conclude. Clearly the calipers are not functioning correctly. I also don't like the new design of the brake retaining clips. I couldn't slide the old pad out easily, had to hit it to force it out, maybe the excessive friction material that built up around the clips prevented the pad from moving? Either way, the previous models retaining clip style worked well and had good calipers, so why change it?

I will monitor the brakes closely and lubricate the parts often to try and avoid this.

There have been too many safety related issues with these cars in recent years and in comparison to the last two models of the Corolla, this one has been a disappointment. We had a 1999 Corolla and still have our 2003 Corolla and did not have any issues with them. Most of the changes Toyota has done for 2009 seem pointless:

poor brakes, awful steering (yes the car wanders on the highway, really annoying) and we all know of the accelerator problems.

Toyota: If you are going to change a design, please do a reasonable amount of practical testing and failure analysis so you don't compromise safety. Also, please stop your dealers from beating around the bush...there are hundreds of complaints online about brake issues so retrofit the design and do a recall!

After a two months that I bought the car, in the highway at high speeds (65-75 Mph) traffics stop suddenly so I have to brake to hard, dealer use to call "Panic Breaking", the brake pedal went almost all the way down and you feel clearly the car barely slow down, so I had to pump twice then I feel the hard breaking and squeaky tires on the road, my heart was pumping to hard also afraid I will kill somebody else or myself, I took the car to the dealer they say no problem found, after several weeks it happen again so during this time Toyota come up the floor mats recall, take it back to a different dealer finally they found that the rear pads has a huge gap between rotor and pads meaning needs adjustment this issue were fix!... BUT!.... another problem come up after the car was delivered to me, I notice almost right away the steering wheel was shaking very bad when I apply the brakes on the highway, what it happens?... the dealer technicians during test and fix the rear brakes they drove the car for test breaking hard several times creating damage in the front rotors, took it back to the dealer now they say is a different problem and it will cost $500.00, I give up the arguments with the dealers, took the car to a private professional shop and replace front rotor and pads for 400.00 included labor. No more Toyota I will switch to Honda next time....

I purchased a 2009 Toyota corolla with 5000 miles already on it. After few months, brakes started SQUEAKING noise. Brake seems to be loose. I had to push very deep to apply brakes. I am not happy with brakes of 2009 Toyota Corolla. Other things of this car are very good.

Update from Dec 7, 2011: update: Last month, I took the car to Dealer and showed them the technical bulletin: http://www.empirepao.com/tsb/T-SB-0392-09.pdf

The dealer replaced brake pads and other things free under warranty though the warranty was expired. SB0392-09 DEC 09 Brakes - Premature Front Brake Pad Wear

TOYOTA GAVE ME THE RUN AROUND. COMPLAINED REPEATEDLY ABOUT THE BRAKES SQUEAKING AND THE DRUMS FELT LIKE METAL TO METAL NO MATTER WHAT. I HAD ALREADY REPLACED THE PADS AT 17000 AND TODAY AT 35072 WAS TOLD HAD TO DO A COMPLETE BRAKE JOB. (DRUMS, PADS, ROTORS). THIS IS THE SECOND BRAKE JOB FOR A 2009 COROLLA S WITH ONLY 35072 MILES ON THE CAR. I REPEATEDLY COMPLAINED ABOUT THE "GRINDING NOISE" IN THE FRONT END/BRAKES WITH NO RESULTS. I EVEN TOOK IT TO BRAKE MASTER FOR THERE INPUT- THE SAME "THERE IS NOTHING WRONG" TODAY AFTER 407.00 DOLLARS OUT OF MY POCKET AND NUMBER TWO BRAKE JOB......TOYOTA JUST ISN'T MAKING CARS LIKE THEY USE TOO......