Warm brakes after going down hill

Hello all, I was driving in mountains, went about 7miles down hill with speed 30-40mph. I was breaking gently and shortly. My brakes were warm also thanks to hot weather. After I was out of mountains, I stopped in a washing station to use a high pressure washer to clean my car and wash my wheels. I forgot to check if they were still warm. I washed my car and after I checked if they were still warm, I could hold my hand there. Do you think the braking system could get damaged by this washing? I know it might be a silly question as rain would be similar. Thanks for your thoughts.

My mazda is a 2.5 with 15000 miles.
 
I don't drive in the mountains very often, but when I do - I manually shift to a lower gear on long declines. This mixed with occasional braking. Is that a bad practice? I understand it may heat-up the transmission.
 
Probably not a good idea to hit the rotors with cold water when its still hot. Let it cool off a bit.
 
Brakes get warm, friction gets turned into heat. If the rotors were hot (can't touch them) then yeah blasting them with cold water is a bad idea. The thermal shock from very hot to very cool, could lead warping the rotor.
 
I don't drive in the mountains very often, but when I do - I manually shift to a lower gear on long declines. This mixed with occasional braking. Is that a bad practice? I understand it may heat-up the transmission.

no harm imo. I don’t let the Rpms go higher than 3500-4000. safer than applying the brakes down the entire decline.
 

He covers all of the advantages of engine braking in his video better than I can in a single post.

To the OP, yeah, I’d be careful hitting the rotors with a large amount of water immediately after a downhill brake descent. If your car is braking fine right now without any pulsation or vibration, no harm done.
 
I washed my car and after I checked if they were still warm, I could hold my hand there. Do you think the braking system could get damaged by this washing? I know it might be a silly question as rain would be similar. Thanks for your thoughts.
Cold water on hot [standing still] brakes can lead to warped rotors. Not the same as rain as the car is moving and the rotors are cooling evenly as they spin.
 
Thank you everybody for sharing your opinion. I forgot to say I was driving about 10-15min after I was out of mountains before I stopped to wash my car. I checked today and no noise while braking, no vibration. So hopefully it’s fine. Will go to mazda service next to check.
 
I guess you could look underneath and see if anything is leaking (other than a/c condensate) but if they work ok I wouldn't worry about them. I'm sure lots of people wash their cars after driving. I mean, was there steam and hissing?
 
I guess you could look underneath and see if anything is leaking (other than a/c condensate) but if they work ok I wouldn't worry about them. I'm sure lots of people wash their cars after driving. I mean, was there steam and hissing?
Thank you for comment. I didnt see any steam, prewash was done with hot watter. No hissing observed.
 
If there was a loud noise, cracking or ping sound and now the brakes are 'wobbly' I would worry. I had a rear brake overheat and I used water to help cool it off. It's been fine.
 
Brake rotors get very hot when they are working hard.
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