Best brake rotors that won't warp

[88Accord-DX]

I know they warp, read the post above yours. That was some B.S. some guy was trippin on not long ago. Something about cemenite etc. (was crazy & that thread got locked. )

[LX-incredible]

(was crazy & that thread got locked. )

Both of them.

[Ichiban]

I live around some of the steepest roads in north america. Some of our hills (Trail hill, Salmo Creston) are 6-10% grade for 10-30 kilometers. Both of these roads have runaway lanes at regular intervals as well as mandatory brake checks for heavy vehicles at the top. Needless to say, I've personally seen 3 or 4 really bad accidents involving semi's, a couple involving cars, and a pile of destroyed brakes on passenger cars and heavy vehicles.

There is usually an accident a week here because of overused brakes, fade, and yes, brake fires, on everything from 18 wheelers to Civic's.

Just ask 2ndgenguy, he actually DROVE here and back.

The moral of the story, overheating your brakes will fuck them.

[2ndGenGuy]

But wouldn't he need to replace the pads that are causing the problem in the first place, before he tries the 80-40 thing?

Not if you just want to cook off the pad deposits. But usually after doing this, you may want to replace the pads. Any pads, I think would be fine for getting rid of excess deposits. But you'd at least want to pull the pads off and sand off the glazing. typically if you have the deposits, and you are actually able to burn them off, you won't have shuddering anymore. Replacing them would be like preventative maintenance, I suppose.

And yeah, I've been to where Mike lives. It's fucking crazy hills everywhere! Heat will cook your brakes. If anybody knows what heat and endless hills can do, its that guy!

All I've ever advocated, is if you have shuddering, try the simple, easy, cheap method of cooking off the deposits. If that doesn't work, they're probably warped and go ahead and toss on some new rotors. I think rotors warp probably less often than most people think, but I do think they can warp. And heating the shit out of them will warp them. The idea is to heat them without overheating them... Seriously, why not try the harmless, free fix first?

[2oodoor]

OUt of the hundreds of rotors I have turned I have noticed that after the first cut the out of spec place is usually about the same shape and size of a brake pad. That being the case I would say that a large percent of warped rotors happen when the car is stopped after a hard braking. After a hard brake to a stop I always leave room to roll up a little or either go to neutral and get off the brake pedal. Holding the pads down on the rotor does not let the rotor cool off uniformly.
Then there is the contaminated 'warped" condition that is being described a lot here.This is where some foreign material, whether from a brake pad, tire/wheel dressings like eagle or armor all.. has got onto the rotor surface and made hot spots, hard spots, glazing or crytalization.
An finally there are just cooked rotors like you would find in an uneven set up or extreme grade braking. The uneven set up would be from the rear brakes not doing their part and overworking the fronts. Or from bad flexable brake lines not letting brake fluid travel both ways thus not releasing the caliper in a timely manner, as well as a bad caliper that sticks or caliper mounting that does not allow the caliper to float freely which causes one pad to do most of the work on that side.
Any or all of these conditions can make way for the other to begin or add to causing problems, that is why it is so important to do a thorough check up when reparing out of true rotors.

[Vanilla Sky]

I've always been told to bed new rotors with a set of old, but still servicable pads, then replace the pads. Seems I've gotten bad info.

[Ichiban]

I've always been told to bed new rotors with a set of old, but still servicable pads, then replace the pads. Seems I've gotten bad info.

I've had a thought, maybe the "bed the new rotors with the old pads" isn't so far off. Heating (bedding) brakes can cause the adhesives and bonding agents to melt and flow out of the pad material, so it makes sense to do this to your old pads, not the brand new ones.

Cook the old pads, and throw them in the garbage like you were going to anyways...

Maybe? Any thoughts on this?

[2ndGenGuy]

I agree with all of the above. When I got my EBC pads, the box said "DO NOT USE WITH NEW ROTORS." It said that it's best to break in your rotors on old pads, then use the broken in rotors to bed your new pads. I think the idea is you don't want to do them both at the same time... The EBC pads had a "Break in material" on them though, that is kinda like a gel coating. Supposedly its an incompatible material with whatever materials are on a new set of rotors.

It seems to me it would be especially true with rotors that have been zinc plated for prettyness. The zinc plating is on the braking surface as well, and that stuff moves around a whole lot. I had some massive shuddering in my brakes when I first put them on my car, but once I went out and burned that crap off, my brakes were smooth as buttah.

[ghettogeddy]

i still see the point that if ur changing your rotors due to the pads u dont want to use them on your new rotors right, 90% of the time when im changing rotors im doing it cause the pads f'ed them up

[Strahan]

I had a rotor warping problem with my old Galant. I bought a new pair of rotors and took them to a local shop to be cryo treated, after that never had them warp again and they lasted a long time.