OE Honda pads have been horrible, but they hardly dust at all. JD Power Performance must be more important to Honda than braking performance. I use Axxis Ultimate ceramic pads on my ‘06 Civic Si, and will be upgrading the pads of my Fit soon. The Si stops dramatically better, especially in rain. The OE pads on my ‘04 Accord were annoyingly bad, leaving an uneven layer of crud deposited on the rotors after a year…but very little dust! Aftermarket pads made everything better, and knowing I could stop made cleaning the wheels a satisfying experience.

And if you are on a twisty mountain road, going downwards and your brakes give up, only because you wanted less dust, are you still that happy?

Wrong assumptions. IMHO, OEM consumables (i.e., tires, brake pads, shocks, etc) are usually pure garbage that the automaker in question has attempted to procure as cheaply as possible. The stock pads and rotors on my 06 Honda Accord fade like crazy, give shitty pedal feel, etc. Switching to Akebono ProACT pads with Baer rotors shortened stopping distances dramatically and stopped the fade.

I have often wondered why EVERY time I get out of the car wash with my Sti that I have to put my foot through the floor to break even at parking lot speeds

This may have to do with being too cold? I know not to hit hot breaks with cold water. This is called thermal shock. These breaks must have a huge penalty for being wet and cold.

This always applys to the first stop then the bremco’s work like a charm.

As for the dust when I bought my Subaru new it was really bad. IMO more breaking=more break dust. I prefer using gears.

Cheers

One word of advice, do not use a water hose on the front wheels when the brake rotors are hot.

Power6: I replied… it was long… with links. GAH filtered or something. I emailed Farago about it.

Very welcome… I’m just starting to understand brakes. There is an incredible depth to this topic. This level of understanding has taken me the better part of a year to attain. A brake system engineer will be able to school me something awful. However that won’t stop me from rambling a bit… maybe Fargo will delete due to length but I’ll post it anyways. Hi Robert!

I agree that everything is a tradeoff… and some pads cost a whole lot more than others.

This is a Subaru worksheet I found… the guy who built it was probably a bit more geek than I am… respect the effort he put forth. http://files.getdropbox.com/u/913220/brakemath.xls

When working with a particular vehicle I usually assemble a vehicle specific brake system bias calculator (a generic one I like http://pws.prserv.net/usinet.Young/BrakeBiasCalculator.html) using excel and do some analysis of the stock system. Once I know the stock bias I can target that and plug in front and rear pad coefficients as values… this allows me to get close to the stock bias but gain temperature range or reduce pedal effort or whatever the objective was. This sort of calculator becomes more useful when comparing the torque production of say a four or six piston caliper with a larger rotor… and how those components will work with the existing rear brakes. With a calculator you can determine how much more coefficient is needed in a rear pad to keep the car biased correctly once a big front brake kit has been installed. Granted this is somewhat academic and theoretical, some trial is necessary to validate the calculated numbers. I have however had good results geeking out and using this technique.

IMO the smart way to approach brake upgrades is to decide WHAT is wrong with the brakes. It is possible to upgrade one aspect of a car’s brakes but hinder another. So you may gain repeatability but also gain stopping distance. I think that stock brake systems are often optimized for short stopping distances rather than stamina (repeated stops ad nauseum).

A WRX is probably going to have a reasonably well optimized system from the factory as it is a sporty car. The stock bias should be good for general use. That is to say… if the car is balanced and controllable under heavy braking with the stock brakes then why screw with the bias unless you have made other changes to the car the folks at FHI probably have the biasing optimized. If you need more temperature range then seeking a pad with a higher temp range but similar to stock torque production front & rear is a good move. You may also need to start thinking about brake cooling or directionally vaned rotors which are much like your turbocharger, a radial flow turbine… centrifugal flow etc.

What sort of tinkering and pad coefficients you use should be based on what sort of hydraulic brake circuit you have. If you’re dual diagonal… it is easier than if you are longitudinally split and have a rising rate type master cylinder for brake proportioning. Nissan and Subaru did this… your pressure bias is dynamic not static… makes pad selection a bit harder as you kinda have to know what pressure you will be achieving during what rate of deceleration. Again… I’m just starting to understand these things. I’ve only worked with half a dozen cars to date and most are Audi models with the dual diagonal brake circuits.

Hope this helps.

just remember – everything is a tradeoff

noise
performance
dust

you can’t have it all.

qfrog…Thanks for the info, I think I followed most of it! Obviously you understand brake pads on a whole other level, in much more depth.

All that aside, can you tell me, other than experience, are there any specs I could be asking for when buying high-perf pads that would help me buy the right thing on the future? Would a mfr. willingly provide anything of use?

I ask because in the future I might want to say…swap 12.4″ Legacy GT rotors and calipers for the 11.x” stock setup on my WRX. The rear brakes are just about the same size and spec on both cars, and I can easily figure out the piston area and therefore leverage difference, but I don’t know how to figure out what sort of pad would make sense if the clamping force is higher, or how to quantify that. There is plenty of talk about whether a brake swap like this “throws off brake balance” on either side, but no talk of how the math works out for any of that…

If you want to loose your fillings when you step on the binders, then you will pay the price with black,ugly dust.

I have found pads which were listed as “Semi-metallic” to be lower in dust than OEM, however the first brake application in the cool morning will open your eyes faster than a double expresso as you slide past your intended stopping point.

There are two detailing products that come to mind that are NOT “wheel wax” which IMO is useless.

One, from Michelin (the tire maker,)is an colorless effervescing spray which seems to work by establishing an anti-static state on your wheel surface- the dust is just ‘repelled’. The other from Eagle 1, is also a clear spray, but this seems to deposit a clear shield coat on the wheel. The Eagle 1 product has a side benefit in that it makes the wheels shine like you spent hours buffing them out. Both products seem to emit enough VOC’s to anesthetize a cow-so do like Bill Clinton did.

The only problem; you will be a slave to every rain storm, or puddle you drive through, as brake dust and water make a deposit similar to fine black cement regardless of your application.

Other than that, both of those products work well enough to keep your wheels clean for at least 10-14 days of everyday driving.

Regards,
BD

Is it? I was under the impression that it wasn’t any worse than normal street dirt, and certainly far less nasty than road salt.

I usually only cleaned and re-protected my wheels (and the whole body) before and during winter to mitigate salt damage. They seemed to do fine.

I’ll also weigh in for ceramics. I have EBC Red Stuff (love ‘em) on my old tank. The first stop in really cold weather is a few feet longer, but after that they might as well be arrestor cables.

(My wife’s car is a Ford, so we don’t discuss those brakes.)

I recently changed the stock pads out of my 1996 Porsche 993 for a set of Porterfield R4S pads. Like them a lot, used to use them on my old Carrera 3.2 – low dust, better modulation, really bite well, no fade, great compromise between street and track performance, and according to my Porsche mechanic who also races, they’re better on rotor wear than the factory OEM pads.

The caveat is to do a little homework first. There are plenty of on-line forums and web sites relating to specific marques that can be a great source of “on the ground” information from current and former owners. Brake pads are usually a well-discussed topic on the sites, so you should be able to glean quite a bite of insight from forum members’ comments on what pads work vs. what don’t for specific applications.

As a general rule of thumb, though, for a street-driven car, even one that is occasionally tracked or autocrossed, stay away from high-friction coefficient pure “race” pads. There are plenty of good high-performance street pad options (like the Porterfields) that produce low dust and improve braking performance over stock pads, while being kind to rotor wear.

Bottom line: Do some research up front, decide which pad will likely work best for your needs, then just do it. It’s a relatively simple and inexpensive (in most cases) mod that usually pays real braking performance dividends.

I’ve noticed that cold behavior, but then it went away when I switched to the PF’s more costly brake pad model. (which name currently escapes me). Then again, it really doesn’t get very cold in Houston, so this is FWIW.

If you don’t do your own brake jobs (come on, its stupid easy these days) I can see why spending $$$ on shields is a good idea. And for most people on flat roads, they aren’t gonna feel a difference.

————

albert : Sometimes for the better, but in most cases for the worst. And if you are on a twisty mountain road, going downwards and your brakes give up, only because you wanted less dust, are you still that happy?

Its one thing to have faith in OEM engineering, its another to think they put the absolute best stuff on their products.

Luckily I am not the only person saying this, but you can use other brands of pads for the same stop, with less dust.

–chuck

A lot of commenters want to change the pads for pads that produce less dust. OK. But it seems that we have here a lot of people knowing more about brakes than the Audi engineers.
Changing the pads for another type, changes the braking performance. Sometimes for the better, but in most cases for the worst.

And if you are on a twisty mountain road, going downwards and your brakes give up, only because you wanted less dust, are you still that happy?

Friction materials are tricky and the combination and proportions of materials used in a pad will play into how much friction a pad offers at different temperatures.

If you look at the temperature/coefficient graphs available for pad materials you’ll see some pads offer drastically less friction when cold. You might have a pad that offers 0.30 coefficient when at say 100*F but 0.40 at 400*F. That is a 33% increase in friction for the same pedal pressure. You’re going to notice that. SO an EF DOT rating pad might not be so great if you like cold stops but don’t have huge diameter rotors to afford leverage, or huge diameter caliper pistons to afford massive clamping force which can balance out the low coefficient pad material.

Not all performance pads are horrible when cold, EBC yellows circa 2005 were scary and dangerous when cold… they’re also a meh pad. Ferodo DS3000 are actually streetable but they are loud and probably eat rotors… but they don’t seem to give that non-retarding sensation of a cold track pad. Yes those are both track only pads but it illustrates the point that not all performance pads have to be crap when cold.

I too use the Porterfield R4-S and they worked great in balance but I selected the R4-S due to it’s coefficient at temperature and the temperature range offered by the pad.

I figure I should also mention…

Some pad mfg’s will provide info on pads, others will only suggest pads for you. Having done some brake system calculations and tinkering with custom brake systems I lean towards being provided technical info prior to consideration for purchase.

Some pads are a particular formulation regardless of the pad shape. As in a Ferodo DS3000 for a 996 is the same material as it is for a Honda Civic Si. The pad formulation on OE pads is usually listed on the backing plate, the DOT may require this. Aftermarket pads aren’t always so transparent when it comes to formulation. An aftermarket pad from brand X named Pad Y may not be the same exact material formulation for demonstrate the same coefficient of friction as pad Y for a different caliper. I’ve seen this as evidenced by different DOT pad ratings on the same brand/product pad material for different caliper designs.

What? The whole car!!!!! ;-}

The New York Times
July 6, 2009
Brake Dust: A Problem That’s Not Really a Problem

True, that is a good point. Yes money is one of the things that can overcome the tradeoffs of cheap OEM pads, and I did overlook that.

I think it still depends who you are. I still wouldn’t reccomend it to my mom because she wouldn’t see the value in a new set of pads and the labor she would have to pay for if I can’t get there to do it myself. Plus, as you probably know from almost any performance pad, there is a tradeoff in the first couple dead-cold stops each day that is probably better left to those who know what is happening down there.

Changing pads is something I would certainly do, and is probably the better idea, and appropriate for everyone in this audience, so I retract my former sentiments.

To that end I would reccommend Porterfield R4-S, not too much dust, and they work well from bitter cold to track days. Just make sure they don’t put the race version R4 in the R4-S box, like they have done to me twice!

Try switching pad material, your mileage may vary though. I found the Hawk HPS pads that many folks are recommending made loads of murky brown dust on my WRX. Slotted rotors may not have helped. Axxis Ultimates were much better from a dusting perspective. Both offer excellent braking, though the HPS pads were a liitle reluctant to stop for the first time on really cold mornings.

Waxing your wheels helps a little bit, but not much (I actually waxed half of my wheels with Rejex once to test this, perhaps another ‘wax’ would be better – Zaino perhaps).

If you swap rims, you could try going for some dark ones. The gunmetal Rota Attacks I use on my WRX in the summer can hide a lot of filth.