Tyler Allen

I live in the mtns and my rotors are constantly getting warped. Had originals turned twice. Was advised against slotted and or drilled by an Acura Mechanic and told to stick with original rotors. What would be an improvement that would offer better breaking and not get warped. We get a lot of rain up here!

Anicra

I am in the limited population, I have had excellent luck with EBC BSD rotors and yellowstuff, use OEM shims. (creates little too much dust honestly). I would if you did not want to spend that much money. I had excellent luck on my CL type S with Akeboko and Stoptech with Centric 120 Series Cryo-Treated Rotor or Stoptech has cyro sloted rotors too. Rofl, I bought these ebc because I knew doing the Yellowstone and Blackhills killed my OEM rotors on my CL typeS. I didnt notice anything wrong with the OEM until I had to start doing major heavy duty breaking on huge declines constantly. I didnt have any issue with the EBC, but that is just me. Maybe it was just luck and they were at max size on the rotors.

losiglow

iTrader: (1)

Short version:

Get some semi-metallic pads and put them on the existing rotors to see if that fixes the problem after a couple hundred miles.

Long version:

I feel your pain. I've posted on this a few times before. I've dealt with more brake problems with the 4G than any other car I've ever owned. By far. I've gone through 4 sets of rotors and 3 sets of pads trying to fix the problem. My problem was solved (so far...) by going from ceramic to semi-metallic pads. However, I only have about 5K miles of driving showing the improvement so the jury's still out. I believe it's fixed the problem because I'm currently using rotors that previously were pulsating with ceramics which has now largely stopped since I installed semi-metallics.

Some people believe that rotors never really warp. I don't know if that's true. The theory is that the pulsation is typically from an un-true hub or incorrect lugnut torqueing which then causes a buildup of pad material in the case of ceramic pads or uneven wearing of the rotor in the case of semi-metallic pads. What is known for sure is that ceramic and semi-metallic pads work somewhat differently in terms of friction on the rotor. Ceramic pads coat the rotor in brake pad material which then interfaces with the pad whereas semi-metallic is more of a metal-on-metal friction. There are several advantages and disadvantages to the way both work. Ceramics are typically quieter and shed less dust than semi-metallic because there's not the metal-on-metal contact or as much wear on the rotor. However, in this case, that's exactly what I think fixed the problem.

I mentioned this in another post - there was a guy on a BMW M3 forum that used some Hawk Blue racing pads, which are very abrasive high-metallic content pads, on his pulsating rotors which previously had ceramic pads. After only a hundred miles or so, the pulsating was completely gone. The theory is that the metallic pads stripped away the ceramic coating and sort of "turned" the rotors while still on the car. He then installed the previous ceramic pads and the problem was gone. I believe he mentioned that he's had to do it again after several thousand miles due to the fact that the ceramic coating began to be uneven again.

I didn't want to buy a $150 set of brake pads so I just opted for some cheapo semi-metallic pads from Autozone. They smoothed out the braking after about 200 miles. I get just a little bit of pulsating if I'm going really fast and have to brake really hard. Otherwise, it's largely gone. I get some brake squeal on occasion and probably get more dust (can't tell because my wheels are already a matte-grey color). As a pleasant side effect, semi-metallic pads have a bit better stopping power than ceramics and don't suffer from cold or wet like ceramics can. They wear out rotors faster but I don't care about that. And we're not talking rotors wearing out in 20K miles or something. More like 60K miles instead of 100K miles (at the worst). That's fine by me. And they dissipate heat better than ceramics.

The pads were $22 from Autozone. And so far, I'm keeping them on there as long as they keep working this well.