I have a 91 Civic with 4 wheel disk brakes and I want to upgrade to the drilled/slotted disks.
What is a good brand to get?

 

EBC makes decent rotors. They're pricey. DBA makes good rotors...but they're like $120-140 each for certain apps.

Why are you doing this?

 

I want better braking and the drilled / slotted look good.
Thank much for your reply and I welcome any additional advice you can provide.

 

what is your intended use?

 

ive never used or seen a "bad" rotor.

just cheaper and more expensive (waste of money). and with aesthetic features like slotting, drilled, or painted surfaces.

the cheapest autozone rotors work. if you want to blame warping on cheap rotors, your wrong.

 

I have had many,many improvements made to my Dream Machine and better brakes is just another improvement. It will improve braking and also appearance.
I'm car crazy and can't help it.
Thank you for your reply.

 

If you want great braking, get great tires, good pads, and refresh the fluid. Call it a day. You can put the most awesome track-bred 12" monoblock equipped brake kit on your car and it's still not going to stop if you have 175 section width all-seasons on it.

Stock brakes are fine for most street applications, unless you find yourself doing a lot of downhill braking and need more heat capacity.

I understand being car crazy (most of us are here for the exact same affliction), but realize that your money can be better spent in other areas. Look at the package as a whole.

 

PasswordJdm sales nice rotors with hawk calipers.

 

if you want to look good, clean up your calipers. tear them down, powder coat them, new rotors with painted centers, and some slightly higher quality pads like hawk hps should be fine since it sounds like your dream machine is probably not going to need much more.

 

If you're not interested in performance, and you just want the drilled/slotted look.... rockauto.com has drilled/slotted powerstop pad and rotor sets with good pricing.

If you do want performance, the same site has great deals on centric stoptech street performance pads and any brand of blank (plain face) rotor.

Then you'd want a good fluid. For the street, Valvoline DOT3/DOT4 Synthetic seems to work just fine. It can even hanflehandle some track use.

 

I am very appreciative of all the fine replies that I have received from so many knowledgeable people. This website is a lifesaver for guys like me that love their Honda but have little skill.
Again, thank you all.

 

you should post your car up, a lot of stuff goes into braking, so yea cool insert brand name here rotors, and ebc pick a color compound is great..

but if you're rocking 14x5.5 wheels with continental tires.. thats kinda just silly.

 

I agree, Hawk is the best.

 

Continental makes good tyres though.....

 

Unless you're doing some really aggressive tracking, you won't notice any performance difference going to a drilled or slotted rotor. Cheap drilled rotors have a tendency to crack, and slotted are basically just going to eat up your pads faster.

If you want them for the looks then knock yourself out, but if you want better braking get a good set of pads (like Hawk HPS for a street application) and some decent blanks like Brembo blanks and call it a day.

I've read this theory before, but I've never seen any actual proof to back it up. I've experienced warped rotors first hand which is proof enough to me that there is a big difference between the cheap rotors and the more reputable ones. I used a set of $15 specials with my Hawk HP+'s and they were warped within a couple weeks, went back for another set and same thing. Got some Brembo blanks and have been driving problem free for 2+ years on them.

I'm not sure there would be much difference between a $40 Brembo blank and a much more expensive rotor (at least for 99% of applications), but I can attest first hand to there being a huge difference between a $15 Autozone special and the $40 Brembo. It's not worth the hassle to have to redo the job a month later to save a few bucks.

 

Why would drilled rotors be useful for track use? They're not.

And you've likely never experienced a warped rotor. What you have experienced is uneven brake pad deposits and martensite buildups on a rotor.

Over heated pads that are clamped onto the rotor (instead of being allowed to cool while sitting off of the rotor surface) will leave deposits. Ceramic pads are notorious for this. That's why I stay away from most types of ceramic street pads.

Better brake pads and better driving habits would cure that. Shitty brakd pads and bad driving habits will cause deposits to appear on even the most expensive rotor.

Thats not a theory. Its factual.

You can maybe manage to warp a rotor on the street by losing a wheel on the highway and dropping a car on it?

Buy good pads for better braking feel and performance. The brand of rotor isn't nearly as important.

Bed the pads in properly. Use good driving habits. Don't store the car for long periods with the parking brake on. Etc.

 

if your experience is limited to HP+, it doesnt amount to much to me.

theres plenty of racers who use far more aggressive pads with cheap rotors, as well other ppl using them on the street just fine that you can continue to deny and say theres no proof.

but your experience is your experience, and you can continue to buy brembos.


and i agree with b serious, your first bit of advice also shows you really dont know much about braking either. keep your opinion, feel free to share, but i think its a pretty limited opinion.

 

I had issues with getting my pads properly bedded on my integra, mostly due to finding a safe location to do it, currently on whatever autozone offered at the cheapest.

I think getting on the brakes hard at the local corvette autocross helped bed my pads as I haven't had vibrations since, fast course, with maybe one hard braking point for the most part.

Currently on stoptech street pads.

 

You were braking hard at a corvette meet?! That implies that you were also accelerating fast. Did they ban you for life?!!

 

Anyone that has worked at Autozone, has seen a warped rotor... trust me.

 

Lol. How do you know its warped?

 

http://www.stoptech.com/technical-su...nd-other-myths

warped rotors are a myth. unless they were mechanically damaged by other means, pretty much every single "warped" disk can be attributed to brake pad deposits.

/thread

 

what? no, I was mostly implying With the layout of their courses with a hard 70-0 stop for a turn around, I was able get a good bed on my rotors there and the pad deposits from the stoptechs went away. I just had a tough time getting the stoptech streets bedded, went as far to as changing rotors only to get the vibrations back.

I guess the stoptech pads were just sensitive to having a proper bed procedure. Because the Winmax W3 pads I have on my other car, I didn't do a bed in procedure and just daily drove them and after the initial rotor deposits the vibration went away and braking is smooth.

 

^I guess you didn't get my side splittingly hilarious, insightful, good looking, and wildly tasteful joke about Corvette meets.

In any case...yes, to be properly used, they have to be bedded in initially. After that, just like any pad, you shouldn't leave the brakes clamped after getting them sizzlin'

 

I love my DBA/EBC Red combo so far, but only have about 400 miles on them.