Rate your brakes! (aftermarket products discussion)

[Mike]

Had to order Rotora slotted's and Hawk pads for my fronts. The EBC Ultimaxx's kindly decided to warp after not even a year and about 7K miles! Gay! The rears seem to be perfectly fine so we'll see how the combination does.

Hope this doesn't happen to mine!

My new brake setup is.

Front:

Powder Coated Legend GS dual piston calipers
Hawk HPS Pads
EBC Ultimaxx Slotted Rotors

Rear:

Hawk HPS Pads
Brembro Blanks

I love this set up the legend GS dual piston calipers make an amazing difference, and can be had for far less than a BBK. Also this size of the caliper is the same as stock so you don't have to run overly large wheels.

[Abailey4]

^I hope for your sake it doesnt happen too. I just bought these damn things right before the megameet which was last July. Paul told me some shitty stuff has been coming out of China so he wasnt surprised. He said that he had a set of rotors that warped after a month that were on a Subaru.

Sad part is I was really liking and impressed with the set up.

[Jeff Likes Bagels]

[Brake component]: Rear pads
[Manufacturer]: Akebono
[Location of purchase]: Amazon
[Impressions]: They work so much better than the worn out pads that used to be on. They do need to be warmed up to be more effective, though. Other than that, I'd definitely recommend them as an OEM replacement.

[Mike]

Had to order Rotora slotted's and Hawk pads for my fronts. The EBC Ultimaxx's kindly decided to warp after not even a year and about 7K miles! Gay! The rears seem to be perfectly fine so we'll see how the combination does.

Hope this doesn't happen to mine!

My new brake setup is.

Front:

Powder Coated Legend GS dual piston calipers
Hawk HPS Pads
EBC Ultimaxx Slotted Rotors

Rear:

Hawk HPS Pads
Brembro Blanks

I love this set up the legend GS dual piston calipers make an amazing difference, and can be had for far less than a BBK. Also this size of the caliper is the same as stock so you don't have to run overly large wheels.

Just to revisit it's been just about 5 months, and i'm still very satisfied with this set up.

[thisaznboi88]

Brake component: Front Slotted Rotors
Manufacturer: Centric
Location of purchase: Amazon
Impressions: Really good rotors for the price

Brake component: Front Pads
Manufacturer: Akabono ProAct
Location of purchase: Ebay
Good Bite

[Jeff Likes Bagels]

[Brake component]: 1995 Acura Legend GS dual piston calipers
[Manufacturer]: Nissin
[Location of purchase]: Rockauto.com
[Impressions]: Night and day difference! When you really need to stop, you will stop!

[Brake component]: rotors (front & rear)
[Manufacturer]: Centric CTEK standard blanks
[Location of purchase]: Amazon.com
[Impressions]: Work excellent for the price. They look great once I painted the hubs black. Personally, I would go with these over the Brembo blanks, because both are made in China, and the Centrics are about half the price, for practically the same thing.

[Brake component]: front brake pads
[Manufacturer]: Akebono ProACT
[Location of purchase]: Amazon.com
[Impressions]: These work well as a relatively cheap but effective replacement pad. Have yet to bed them in, however, due to time restrictions and constant traffic. The only gripe I have is that they're not as effective when cold. After about the 3rd or 4th brake, and they warm up, they start working pretty well. Perhaps they will get better after I bed them in. Edit: They perform slightly better now that I bedded them in. However, I will probably try the EBC Greenstuff the next time I need to do the brakes. I was expecting a little more performance out of these Akebono pads.

[mitchigan]

[Brake component]: all four rotors
[Manufacturer]: powerslot power alloy slotted (centric)
[Location of purchase]: tirerack
[Impressions]: not much of a noticeable upgrade from stock (tires are what provides stopping power), I'm not big on slotted or drilled but these were the only ones with the black e-coating on the rotor hat and inside the vanes to prevent corrosion - yes i bit the bait. the black e-coating fades off easily after car washes and applying wheel cleaners so the 400 lifespan hours that powerslot claims is exaggerated

[Brake component]: all 4 pads
[Manufacturer]: satisfied gran sport 6
[Location of purchase]: tirerack
[Impressions]: these pads are holding their dust okay (noticeable on wheels only after a few weeks), and provide a little bit better bite than OEM

[Brake component]: all 4 calipers
[Manufacturer]: Nissin OEM
[Location of purchase]: stealership (online price matched)
[Impressions]: driverside rear was seized so changed all four because of the unsightly rust magnification when rolling on 18's. no improvements but better cosmetics! note: do not try to rebuild brake calipers, big big PITA!

[Jeff Likes Bagels]

Okay, here's an update to my new pads.

[Brake component]: Front brake pads
[Manufacturer]: Hawk HPS
[Location of purchase]: Autoanything.com
[Impressions]: These do feel better than the Akebono pads initially, but not really as much as I expected. I did a quick bed-in, but I'd imagine these will take a couple hundred miles before they get to their prime. When driving on the highway, sudden stops feel a lot better. with the Akebono pads, sudden stops were scary, because the car wouldn't nose-dive or anything, and it would feel like you're still moving because of it. With the Hawk pads, you can feel that nose-dive a lot more, and they stop a lot better. I can't wait until they're bedded in after a couple hundred miles. We'll see how it goes with the brake dust. So far I've driven about 80-100 miles on it.

[fatbastard]

FRONT
Brake component: 12.6" Wilwood Superlite 4-piston calipers with 1-piece slotted rotors
Manufacturer:  Wilwood/Fastbrakes
Location of purchase: Excelerate Performance website
Impressions:  Greatly improved braking feel and consistency over stock! Slight humming sound when part braking and only when brakes are not yet warmed up.

REAR
Brake component: Slotted/Dimpled Big Rotor Upgrade
Manufacturer: Fastbrakes
Location of purchase: Fastbrakes website
Impressions:  Comments same as above minus the humming sound.  No complaints.  looks great too!

Brake component: Brake Pads 50-1200F
Manufacturer: Winmax
Location of purchase: local distributor
Impressions: Great pad bite with minimal dust.

[striktlyaccord]

[Brake component]: EBC Ultimax slotted front brake rotors
[Manufacturer]: EBC
[Location of purchase]: buybrakes.com
[Impressions]: They stop well and are pretty comparable to my old Brembo/Hawk setup.  The hubs and outer perimeter are coated in black which is nice.  The braking surface is also black until that's rubbed off by the pads, and the slots are a unique design.  No excessive noise or vibration thus far.

[Brake component]: EBC Greenstuff 2000 series front brake pads
[Manufacturer]: EBC
[Location of purchase]: buybrakes.com
[Impressions]: Good stopping power for street use, even when not fully warmed up.  Not too fond of the lime green color, but what are ya gonna do?  No noises or squealing at this point which is good.  They do produce a comparable amount of brake dust to my old Hawk pads, except the Hawk dust was brown and the EBC dust is black.

[Brake component]:  Acura Legend GS sedan dual piston front calipers (rebuilt & silver powder coated by Paul) 
[Manufacturer]: Nissin
[Location of purchase]: Tim
[Impressions]: No complaints here so far.  They work as they should and produce a great bite when you really clamp down on the brakes.  They look great behind my wheels too.

* I also have Goodridge G-Stop stainless steel front brake lines that help too.

[Rushzer0]

[Brake component]: EBC Black Dash slotted front & rear brake rotors
[Manufacturer]: EBC
[Location of purchase]: My workplace
[Impressions]: They stop great (after the break-in period) Much better then the stock rotors, and much less vibration. The black coating on mine wore off pretty quick, but I attribute that to living on an island in the Atlantic :p

[Brake component]: EBC Greenstuff front & rear brake pads
[Manufacturer]: EBC
[Location of purchase]: My workplace
[Impressions]: Great stopping power.  A little bit of noise or squealing when moderately braking hard, otherwise totally quiet .  They do produce a fair amount of black brake dust, more then my stock pads

[timot_one]

Just to let you guys know, the slotted rotors contribute to the brake dust.

[DreaminAccord]

Has anyone tried out the R1Concepts Premium Series Blank OEQ Rotors and/or Posi-Quiet Ceramic pads? At 27k miles, my front rotors are starting to warp (I can feel they are starting to lightly pulse at highway braking and OEM pads still have a lot of life on them) so I started researching aftermarket rotors/pads. R1 has this setup on sale right now and I've used their brand before on my Audi - they were pretty well built rotors.

IMHO Drilled and/or Slotted rotors are overkill for a DD. I originally got them for the Audi because they set off my RS6 wheels, as well as, "all the great hype" that was talked about regarding their performance. However, within about 3k miles of daily driving, my car would brake horribly! The pulses from the slots cutting into my brake pads were so bad, my entire steering column and cabin would shake. I immediately threw them in the trash.

If you want excellent heat distribution to cool down your rotors, find rotors with a split vain casting rather than getting drilled rotors.

TIA

[fatbastard]

planning on swapping out the Fastbrakes Wilwood 12.6" front BBK for some AP Racing 4pot 13" with floating rotors. anyone with experience with this?

[06RockHead]

Brake component: Front and Rear Blank Rotors, Premium High Carbon
Manufacturer: ProStop
Location of purchase: Pepboys
Impressions: Excellant rotors, super quite. Came with painted hats and edges which have held up to the Pa salt and have not rusted. I used these before and they held up on the track at PIR. meaning repetitve 110 to 40 MPH. Never warped or cracked or made noise.

Brake component: Premium Full Ceramic Pads, fronts and rear
Manufacturer: ProStop
Location of purchase: Pepboys
Impressions: Once again excellent performance, not effective at all when cold. Once they warm up i often find myself backing off the breaks only to have to breaking force continue to increase. When pushed they maintain breaking power even at scorching track temps at PIR again. Pedal feel is as consistant as it gets for stock break equipment. I have had several sets of breaks before this setup mainly orginal rotors and pads or just different pads they always got loud when driven aggressivly. The ProStops are always quite no matter how hot. They produce very little dust and never squeek. Bed in has been short on both sets. After sitting for awhile they feel a little rough but smoothen out almost immeadiatly. My last set lasted a long time even with two tracks days in the mix. Id recommend these if your aggressive everyday, like low break dust, and good performance. I cant speak for the price since i have a hook up at pepboys and dont pay full.