One of the biggest causes of hot / overheated brakes is not from constant braking in stop and go traffic, but from long highway runs where you don't touch the brakes at all! The reason: the calipers do not have a mechanism that return them to a neutral position. When you take your foot off the brake, the pads are separated from the rotor by a micron or two. Friction with the air in such a confined space heats up the rotors. (If your caliper is sticky, the pads may not separate at all causing even more heat.)

Volvo OEM equipment has improved considerably since my experience with a 745T and 945T. The OEM pads for these vehicles absorbed little heat, reflecting it instead back to the rotors, which would warp in less than 15K miles of mostly highway driving. The solution was a set organic soft compound pads which sponged up the heat; I then got about 35K on a set of pads and twice that on the rotors.

OEM on my current ride has gotten me 27K on my current pads, rotors changed at 70K (but I don't know if they were original). Bought the car at 36K and now have 98K miles on the odometer.
--
(98 S70 T5SE misc mods, mostly lighting) (92 940GLE)

Hey 6Volvo's
When any auto is braking you are tranfering momentum energy to rest. This takes a great amount of effort and the only way to do this to change the momentum to heat. Or something like that:) lol If the brake rotors continually heat up without severe braking then check to see if the calipers are hanging up

Regards
Gazzer

yes, but on a 240, not an 850. The 240 has lower swept area per ton of car than the 850, so the brakes work relatively harder. I was deliberate about trying to heat up the brakes after the rotors were turned and new pads had maybe 150 miles on them... wanted to "cook" them out. Several hard stops from 80 had the rotors glowing red, but that only lasted a couple of minutes. I was deliberate about moving the car at low speeds to avoid sinking heat out of just one spot on the rotors, to avoid warping them. However I am sure that an hour after I stopped they would have been only warm to the touch.

Heh, I have made the (idiotic) mistake of touching my brakes after driving hard with them for a while. I could hear the sound of my skin sizzling off ;)