Good afternoon acuraziners, and happy friday. I grow tired of my incredibly squeaky brakes, so I figured that means I should get some new pads and rotors. I was thinking initially some akebono pads and stop tech slotted rotors (just doing the front at this time). This package comes to $200 total, $40 for pads and $160 for rotors. The akebono pads get great reviews on Amazon.

Then of course I saw the a-spec thread and now I'm looking at that but the ebay link is no longer any good. When I search for the part # online they come up at about $100... is that for 1 wheel? If so that's a lot and they better stop my car fast and maybe spit out unicorns and rainbows in the process.

Does anyone have a good place to get a-spec pads for a good price? Are the pads really THAT GOOD as compared to other ceramic pads?

 

Brembo brakes does not have A-spec pads, unless you are talking about the AT single piston caliper. OEM just get a good bite but you will clean the wheel non stop, ceramic does not have the initial bite as OEM however keep your wheel cleaner for a longer period of time. You have to decide either good bite, performance over dust and noise.

 

Yep just standard calipers. I'm trying to improve braking and reduce noise over whatever crap pads are in it now that we're put on by the non-Acura dealership where I bought it. Noise is so bad that my wife won't even drive it. I don't want to upgrade calipers and what not, just trying to make improvements to what I have for a reasonable amount of $$$.

 

I really like the Akebono ProAct pads with OEM or non-slotted/non-drilled rotors.
They dust a bit less than the standard pads, are very quiet and work well in daily driving and in autocrosses. I find their feel and bite to be pretty darn good-- better than OEM-- and easy to modulate. They have never faded, either.

Stop-Tech rotors have a great reputation; I haven't used them or the Akebono Performance pads.

 

I had Duralast Cmax in the lexus, they are not dusty, get a good bite feedback and best of all you only had to pay for the pads once they are lifetime warranty meaning once set wear down just bring the old one back and they will give you another set for free.

 

This is what I was looking at on Amazon: Akebono ACT787 ProACT Ultra-Premium Ceramic Brake Pad Set (Engineering #ACT564) $41.44 for the fronts.

 

also look at centric rotors, stoptech is the high performance line of centric. if you're just looking for high quality every day rotors, look up centric they are usually cheaper.

i currently have stoptech front pads and they are great, good bite and less dust than oem. for my next set i'm actually going with the akebono performance ultra premium ceramic pads (only akebono available for brembos) because i hear they dust even less.

sounds like you can't go wrong with akebono and stoptech/centric, i would just go with those over oem because you save a bunch of money and don't really lose much performance if at all

 

ASpec pads have way more bite than factory and are a bit more aggressive with almost no noise. I have higher levels of dust on my rear wheels since the rear rotors I have are slotted but not much dust to worry about. Ceramic Pads lack the initial bite that the factory and ASpec brakes have.

There's no such thing as great rotors and pads on a budget. I've been using my racingbrake rotors on the TL for around 120K now and they look great. I've been though 3 sets of aspec rear pads and 2 sets of aspec front pads so far.

Racing brake rotors are a bit expensive but worth every penny. You'll save on rotors for the future and your braking will be so much better.

If you don't want to run the aspec pads, Racingbrake ET300 or ET500 are great pads.

Also you can reapply brake grease and hopefully get rid of the squeal you are having.

 

+1 on the ET300s. I have 140K on a front set of ET300s and they are only half worn...

 

Brake pads garner the biggest variety of responses from people. Any given pad is going have a camp of supporters and opponents. The reason is because of the wide variety of driving styles people have. One man's sporting driving is another man's "taking it easy."

Ultimately, we at Heeltoeauto.com have found the RB Performance products to provide the most well-rounded performance and more people enjoy them than not. We've promoted the RB (that's, Racingbrake) brand since day one here on AZ and continue to be one of the only real places to get them.

We have shaped our HTSpec brake packages around the RB products because they have been very popular and given countless Acura drivers many years of happy use. Please find more about our packages here: https://www.heeltoeauto.com/brakes/
(be sure to select your car at the left to narrow results!)

We also carry a wide range or product, including Nissin, Akebono, and Genuine parts. But for us, the RB products really are the enthusiast's choice.

PS: The ET300 was phased out in favor of the ET500 last year. Same great pad, but offers more performance.

 

I like the premium dimpled and slotted rotors from brakeperformance.com. You can get silver zinc coated or black zinc coated. Brake kits are 25% off right now. Base TL price is $179.56 for rotors and semi-metallic ($2.13 more for ceramic pads). Type -S is $187.08 plus extra $7.66 for ceramic. Lifetime warranty on rotors.