I have had a pulsing/vibration when applying the brakes for a while now, but I believe the problem is with the front brakes. However I heard some grinding in the rear and took everything off and the left inside pad was just down the metal. The rotor isn't bad, but I figure I will need new rotors. I was wondering if someone could recommend some new rotors and pads. I have read through many old posts but I think I am looking after something different than most on here. This car is my daily driver and while I don't want to give up braking performance over what I now have (OEM) I have no desire for increased performance. The only exception is a pad/rotor that won't be as likely to develop the pulsing/vibration like it seems almost all cars have. I would consider infiniti pads and rotors for the rear, but I don't want to try them for the front because obviously they are causing me problems now. I just want something with similar performance, moderate cost, moderate to low dust and less likely to develop the vibration. Thanks.

 

duude.. search in the brakes thread..


https://g35driver.com/forums/brakes-suspension-164/

 

Sounds like your front rotors are warped. A real big cause of this is a lot of people go to drive-thru car washes, or do it yourself car washes where you get out of the car and rinse it down right away. Cars should not ever have warped rotors.

Hot rotors + Cold water= warping.

Go to the marketplace, and go under Vendors: Brakes. They will be very cheap, good perfomance and quality pads that are pretty cheap.

 

I have never taken my car through a car wash. But I have read (from searches on here) that some think it is not a warped rotor but caused by hot spots on the rotor that are now harder and have different grip, or deposits from brake pads after a hard stop and then leaving the brakes applied while stopped. The reason is that I can take my front rotors and check with a dial indicator and they are not warped.

I have checked in the brake forum, but it seems most people on here are interested in performance first and foremost and don't really care about brake dust, durability, or cost.

 

If this were true, wouldn't there be an issue everytime there was a sudden downpour after rain and we drove in huge amounts of water, our rotors would warp?

 

Warped rotors from water is a myth. The reason rotors pulse is due to uneven deposits of friction material from the pads caused by heat. It usually happens if you get the brakes nice and hot and then sit at a traffic light with your foot on the brake pedal. It can happen from other reasons but the primary cause is transfer of friction material from the pads to the face of the rotor. It can happen with ANY rotor/pad setup.

This is a very good read from Stoptech

http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/wp...rakedisk.shtml


Anyway, i'd recommend the OEM stuff again if you aren't interested in a braking upgrade. Fancy rotors are not better despite the marketing claims and these high-performance race pads do offer better bite in the trade-off that they sacrifice cold-braking performance. The only true braking upgrade is rotors with larger diameters and more mass. You can't beat leverage when it comes to stopping power and more mass = better heat dissapation which is why i always wonder why cars with puny rotors (12" or smaller) want to drill holes in them and make their rotors even worse at heat dissipation.

 

I assumed thats the problem was since I know my Mom (who never drives hard) has the problem and washes her tires/rims first at the car wash and another member said that he had warped his discs from doing that so I assumed that was why. But I read Mustang's post, so now I know better.

 

Don't feel badly. A lot of people beleived the same thing. I witnessed MANY heated debates on brake "warping".


A lot of the problems of "warped" rotors is simply driving style. If you brake hard, say down a hill, and then sit there with your foot heavy on the brake pedal, you could be unknowingly causing your pad's friction material to bed into the rotor unevenly leading to pulsation in the disk when you brake in the future. If you come off a highway onramp hard or do some other sort of spirited driving where you come to a stop at the end, i highly recommend shifting into park or nuetral and avoid clamping your brakes down until they can cool with some normal driving.

Where i autocross, everyone brings wheel chocks. At the end of the run, they chock their cars rather than use the e-brake (manual transmissions) for this very reason.

 

I don't mean to thread-jack, but I think I have warped rotors also (same symptoms as the first post). Actually, the vibration is pretty strong. But I checked my brake pads and rotors and they're all still OK thickness-wise.

Should I worry? Do I need to replace them, even though they're not quite ready to be replaced?

If I don't replace my brakes, are there any potentially serious consequences (ie - gross brake failure --> crash)?

 

Try cutting your rotors first since they are not yet at minimum thickness.

Your brakes will not fail. It will just be annoying as hell but they will still stop.