you didn't re-surface/cut your front rotors before putting new pads in??? that gives you a slight shimmy/vibration in the steering wheel sometimes....

 

Always a good idea to flush and replace brake fluid at each pad replacement.
At least once per year vs racer who do it every weekend.

Besides vibration control [the individually tuned acoustic shims to match oem pads] are there to add insulation between piston and pad compound support plate.

Every time brake fluild is over heated its boiling point declines lower and lower and lower. The labeled boiling points [dry] are for brand new out of bottle fluids! Wet boiling point is another matter entirely, kind of an aging portral of what happens at the end of a year.....IF YOU DON"T OVER HEAT THE FLUID.

If you are an aggressive braker every 6 months might be in order or a shift to an ultra premium brake fluid like Motul 600 or better.

 

The orange stuff is brake quiet goop you can get at any automotive supply store....apply liberally to back of pads and shims.

I did not do any hammering on the ice pic, the pins move pretty easily. I tapped lightly with the palm of my hand to get one started I think.

For the rear brake pins you can just grab the blunt part of the pin facing you with some pliers and twist just a bit as you pull them out toward you.

Infiniti states you cannot cut Brembo rotors. There are instructions on the Stoptech sight for removing old brake material with aggressive track pads in a few stops...the Hawk sight directs you to just sand the rotors clean with moderate pressure. This is of course assuming your rotors are true to begin with, and if they are not you should already have a vibration.

 

So OEM rotors are not to be cut even with new pads? I was always lead to believe that when you put new pads ontop of rotors that were not "resurfaced" to smooth, You will get that shimmy/vibration in the wheels....but This is news to me with the OEM rotors....Rotors are true to begin with? what do you mean? thanks for the info!

 

By "true", I mean straight...not warped. Almost all mechanics I have ever talked to said rotors "must" be turned when pads are replaced. The only exception until recently was a guy that built, raced, and serviced his own drag car.

But I was just told by one of the experience mechanics at my local Infiniti dealer that the Brembo OEM rotors should not/could not be turned. Initially I was told to turn them, then that was retracted. At any rate, I have had no problems with noise or vibration since the pad change.

 

dothemath - are you happy with the performance of your Hawk HPS pads? I installed them with slotted Brembo rotors and I am not impressed with the stopping power of the pads. I have to apply much more pressure it seems to get the brakes to grab well.

 

They are ok, but I am not hard on the brakes. They did ok at my track event at Sebring...about the same as the Brembos...but I was even somewhat conservative on my braking on the track.

 

Thanks for the write up... i need to do my front soon

 

Because the techs WON't take the time to do a fine minute clean up cut and get carried away removing more than necessary..........very time consumming to take it off in 0.001" increments may take 2 or 3 trueings, an hours worth of work...........use a fresh bit each time and run the lathe at an extra slow speed............everything is about money and time to do a job.

Instead of spending a $100 hour EACH maybe in labor just replace the rotors.

 

excellent feed back..thanks for the info...yes i think that if the rotor is "true" then pads ontop shouldn't have a problem, I just tried this with my beater car (honda civic) and so far no shimmy/vibration....thanks again!

 

i was looking at the service manual, and didn't see anything about replacing the shims with new ones. isn't this normally good practice?

ps-by the way, there's no drawing indicating any shims on the front either (ie-it's not in the component break-down).

*EDIT-nevermind, it does mention it in the service manual to replace the shims....however, i still couldn't find it on the component break-down.