A Florida appeals court Wednesday overturned a 2008 decision to award a Weston doctor more than $24 million for exposure to brake pads made with asbestos and ordered a new trial.

A Third District Court panel reversed the judgement against Honeywell International, the parent company of Bendix, which made the brake pads that were blamed for causing Stephen E. Guilder's rare and fatal cancer, peritoneal mesothelioma, an ailment which affects the abdominal lining.

Before Guilder's days as a head and neck surgeon, he worked with those pads as a teenager on his stepfather's farm in the 1970s and '80s. In April 2008, a Miami-Dade County jury awarded him and his family $24.2 million, saying that Honeywell was negligent in selling the pads.

Guilder died in September at the age of 52.

The panel found four reasons to reverse the case, one of which involved the $10.4 million of the award that would go to Guilder's children for the loss of a parent. The panel found that the statute regarding this only applied to negligent acts after Oct. 1, 1988, and said the children shouldn't be compensated since Guilder's last known exposure to asbestos was 1982.

``Honeywell is pleased that the appellate court reversed the verdict in the Guilder case and agreed with the company on numerous grounds raised in its appeal,'' Victoria Streitfeld, Honeywell's spokeswoman, said in a statement.

David Jagolinzer, attorney for the Guilders, said he will take the case to the state supreme court.

``I promised Dr. Guilder and his family that we'd fight for them all the way to the end, and we'll fight again if we have to,'' Jagolinzer said.