I'll certainly look into the pads being an issue. There still seems to be pad though. Maybe just not enough. Maybe I'm just looking at them stupid. Not sure.
My main concern of a failure of some sort was primarily from when I pulled the brake handle; there was zero braking response.
My first thought to that situation was that maybe my master cylinder went bad. I recently rebuilt that at the beginning of the year, so I'd like to think it is still fine.
So the first time I pulled the handle and realized nothing was happening, the grinding was not present. Only after I pulled over and actuated the brake handle a few times and regained resistance did the grinding come about. I probably had to actuate the handle like 5 full times before I could feel the brake working again.
After I could feel the brake again, I got back on and started off slow. When I pulled the brake handle, the bike would brake, but the grinding noise was there. It didn't feel like normal braking either.
You know, this does sound
more like a pad problem. But my concern is why did my brake handle suddenly go to free swinging, and then come back to life after actuating? I seriously thought my brake line had been cut for a moment. Did a sudden pad failure require extra space to be made up between the disk and pads that only actuation could solve?