Brake Pad useful life: 9000 miles

I have 14,500 miles on a 2009 Ultra, can someone tell me how to check them? They look a little thin (work fine, no noise) but they look thin new. The service manual gives a thickness but I don't really want to remove them to measure.
 
Daily commute and some highway miles on the weekend. Seems like my rear pads last as long as the rear tire. 8 to 10 K-miles. Front ones get changed every other rear tire.
 
I think the limit is 1mm but a good reference it should be no thinner than the backing plate, you can see one side by looking at it and use a mirror to view the inside pads.
 
Actually, the owner's manual on my 2009 FLHTC states the pad thickness should be more than 0.016 in. (0.4 mm).

At my 15k service, the dealer told me I needed new front pads. I checked them, and I still had about 1.5 mm. I orderered LRB pads. I now have about 19k miles and I still have more than a mm.

The LRB backing plate is 3.20 mm. The total thickness (pad & plate) is about 6.9 mm. So, if you go by the old "as thick as the backing plate" rule (which seems to be a great rule in the auto world) , you may be throwing out a lot of good pad. Meanwhile, I am going to keep a checking mine...and will pull the plug when thinnest pad gets around 0.6-0.8mm.
 
Just replaced mine, both front and rear at just over 13K. The rears were almost smooth with very little groove left in them while the fronts still could have gone atleast 2k more.
 
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