i just put ceramic pads on my car for the slush series #1 that is on sunday (auto X event)... everything was hunky dorey and worked just fine and i pumped the brake to get em up against the rotor and now they are making a humungous amount of noise when i am not even braking... is this common of ceramic pads? will this go away as i break them in? all i can see it doing is making a ___ load of noise and leaving a residue on my rotors... this leads me to believe that its going to go away as i break em in but i dont particularly want to ruin my rotors in the process if its something else. cause then i would be going nowhere this weekend... especially not to the slush run... any suggestions...

 

well, ceramic pads are nice and all, but they have a huge downfall. they heat up like a mother and warp your rotors easily. is it just noise or are you feeling a vibration when you press the brake?

 

Ceramic pads won't heat up anymore than OEM pads.

 

rotor's don't warp from pad heat, hell, show me one warped rotor and I'll show you said rotor with pad deposits, rotors rarely warp, ever. It's just another way for mechanics to take money from you to perform half-aced services and charge you 4x the actual service cost for services you don't need.

ceramics are not good for autocross. ceramics are better for road course racing where they can actually get heated up to the point of being useful, with the cool down time between runs, ceramics are NOT the pads you want to be using, unless the course is more than 2min long (I've yet to see a closed sanctioned autocross that long)

truthfully, you'd be better off running with the stock pads and upgrading the brake fluid to a higher wet boiling temp DOT 3-4 fluid, because the ceramics will be so cold you won't be able to brake properly for more than half the course, and once they start to work at their proper temperatures, you're run's over and they have ample time to cool down again.

 

ummm didnt ask about the viablilty or running ceramics... most the time i dont run auto X... this just happens to be a weekend that i am... the question still remains at
1) are ceramic pads prone to excessive rotor noise?

i just put new rotors on as well so i am gonna take the pads back out clean off the rotors and see if the rotors are rubbing or if its the pads... oh yeah... rotors do warp... alot... mostly cause of stupid drivers. but trust me... i must turn 8 sets a day at work... they warp.

 

When cold yes, ceramic pads sound pretty bad.

 

OK, you guys are making some blanket statements that are way off the mark. The term "ceramic" in relation to brake pads is way overused and is really just a marketing term. I’m not sure where you guys are hearing the information you are sharing but you should really disregard it. Just about any street pad out there today is going to have some level of ceramic and metallic content within it. How a pad is labeled is up to the pad manufacturers who are using popular taglines to sell you pads.

Pads that are labeled as ceramic these days are generally associated with low dust and noise characteristics and are marketed toward folks who want quiet pads with less dust than OEM options. A good example of these pads are the Hawk Performance Ceramic which are marketed toward luxury vehicles with nice wheels. These pads are not track pads, do not have high levels of bite an any temperature range and really do not offer any increased temperature range over other street pads. You will not hear any of us at StopTech recommend the use of a pad like this for autocross or track use since it is not designed for those types of conditions.

The Axxis Ultimate is a pad which is labeled as a “Carbon Kevlar Ceramic" formula, but has very different characteristics than the Hawk formula. Ultimate has very high levels of bite, even at low temperatures and can handle more aggressive driving with its higher maximum operating temperature. Axxis Ultimate, unlike the Hawk Ceramic formula is quite dusty and is prone to making some noise.

So here we have 2 pads, both labeled as "ceramic" with dramatically different characteristics which have both discounted all of the so called "ceramic" pad characteristics which have been posted in this thread so far.

When shopping for brake pads, don’t just ask for a pad made of material X...ask for a pad that has the characteristics you are looking for that will best suit your needs. For example....if you are just driving around town and want a pad with nice bite, low noise and low dust, something like the Axxis Deluxe Plus (labeled as an "organic formula") or Hawk Performance Ceramic would be a great choice. If you are looking to AutoX, run canyons or just drive aggressively and want a high bite pad with good fade resistance at elevated temperatures (but not track temps) then something like Axxis Ultimate or Hawk HP+ would be some great choices.

If you plan to take your car to the track, then a track type pad would be best suited as it will offer much higher levels of bite and maximum operating temperatures which will help it deal with the stress track driving adds to the braking system. Something like and Axxis Ultimate or Hawk HP+ will be fine in the rear calipers since those temperatures will stay relatively low, but up front a club race or track pad is best suited. Something like Hawk HT10, Ferodo DS2500 or Pagid Orange would all be suitable on a car like the tC with a high performance street tire on the track. These pads will be much dustier and noisier than any street pad and will not have good cold bite like a street pad since they are not designed to run in those conditions. What are these track pads made of? Frankly I do not know or care. What I do care about is what temperature ranges they can handle so I can best choose a pad that wont fade on track, and what bite levels they offer so I can choose a pad that fits my driving style.


Hopefully that helps. If you are interested in reading about the characteristics of some pads to see if any suit your needs, you may want to look at our pad descriptions here: http://www.stoptech.com/products/hig...nce_pads.shtml

 

thank you for assuming i have no idea what i am doing... with out you guys i dont know what i would do (sarcasm). thank you for the shameless plug of your companies products.... and again... you all spent so much time flexing your pseudo car knowledge that you all (with the exception of cpt laziness) did very poorly at answering my initial question... gee thanks... everyone at scionlife.