I recently bought some dimpled and slotted rotors w/ ceramic pads. I was getting some pretty bad fade from the stock rotors/pads, along with some pulling to the driver's side when I'd really get on the brakes in a hurry. I thought for sure I was worn a cutting into the driver's side rotor.
Anyways, order the rotors/pads from Brake Performance (because they're US steal and the price was right). I wasn't supprised by the noise that sounds like I stuck a card in my spokes... that is just the gasses discharging from the slots. However, after about 100 miles of careful braking and avoiding high speed braking, I decided to return to a mostly normal driving pattern... still being a little learly of the new brakes. Anyways, now it seems that they're either glazed or something is wrong. I have not noticed a performance problem, but when coming to a complete stop, it almost sounds as though my ABS is engaging. That's not the case, but that's the best way I can describe it. I don't know what is correct in the way brakes are worn in and designed to work.. I don't know if material transfer is supposed to occure for proper performance, or exaclty what the deal is.
I have no warpage, but I'm wondering if I overheated my brakes. I drive in the city where traffic will me moving along at about 70 or so, then come to a complete stop without much warning. I haven't been haulin' A and driving like an assjack.. just to clarify. Otherwise I would expect to hear "you got what you asked for".

 

Carefull braking? you do know you have to give it some very aggresive braking when you first installed these right?

 

Good info, I plan on upgrading my rotors and pads in the near future. I wonder if it is a brand thing, or a break in thing.

 

That's what I thought initially.... gathered that from something I read in a different thread at least a year ago. But, I had also read about people going out and getting on them hard and warping the ish out of them. I have never run slotted rotors before and I know that structurally, they're not as sound as solid rotors. I didn't get cross drilled for that same reason. The manufacturer said to take it easy in their brake-in instructions, and a buddy of mine whose has been working brakes for years said the same thing.. So, I went with the safe side.

What exactly is the proper procedure? This is a first for me.

 

Interesting problem. Back in the day, the instruction was to do lot of hard braking at the get go to bed the pads in. Many of todays materials are different, so that may not no longer hold.

As for slotted rotors, I do not believe it materially weaken the rotors unless over done. For a properly designed rotor, cross drilling should not be an issue, but generally it seems to create a stress riser. Apparently Brembo et al have figured out how to mitigate such problems.

 

Sounds to me like maybe the pads were not bedded properly. I've always been told to bed the pad to the rotors you need to take the car from 60 MPH to a stop (without engaging the ABS system) about 8 times in a row, and then park the car with emergency break off until everything cools down.

 

Depends on the pads. Some of them are "cooked" when made so the heat from hard-stop-break-in [pun not intended] isn't needed.

Mike E

 

this is a stupid question, but arent the rotors rotational? Are you sure you have them in the right rotation. Overheated brakes wont give you the ABS engaging sound, it will just take longer to stop.

 

maybe the brake pad material combined on the rotor surface its causing a problem. try a different set of pads.