Recommendations on Brake Pads?

[gary]

The time has come for me to change the brake pads on my Tib and I have decided that I wanted to get some decent performing pads. With ever other car I have owned, I went to AutoZone and picked up there Lifetime Warranty Pads for $20. I was looking around and finally decided on some Hawk pads. These will be going on freshly turned OEM rotors. The car is my daily driver with some spirited back roads driving from time to time so I want something that will perform when I want them to but also be quiet.

The real question here:

Should I pick up the "Hawk Performance Ceramic Pads" or the "Hawk HPS Street brake pads"? There is only a $4 difference and “Tire Rack” shows almost the same bullets for both. Anyone have experiences with either or both?

[Drftpretty]

Wish I could help.

The only advice I have is:

Do not pay the $600 for Hyundai to resurface your rotors.

Theres a place in Emmaus that will do it for $28. PM me for details.

[gary]

HAhahahaha $600? When new ones from Hyundai are $100 a piece? That si too funny. No it turns out I can't get my lugs off to even rotate my tires so tomorrow morning I am going to let STS deal with that problem. I will deal with the brakes after that.

I didn't order them anyway. Hope there is enough pad left for my inspection on Tuesday.

[TROLL]

are you comparing the HPS to the HP+ pads? if so i would recommend the HPS if your car is mainly daily driven on the street... it should be very good on the street and stand up to any spirited driving you can throw at it, plus auto-x and light track use.
the HP+ are more of a track pad and wont perform quite as well with regular and spirited street driving.
and fwiw pep boys charges $8 per corner at the places where they still resurface the rotors on the car. its a good bit more to do it off the car though on their newer machines.

[gary]

No I wasn't even looking at the HP+ pads. I was comparing the Ceramics and the HPS pads. I am so confused on ceramics right now. Everywhere I read ceramics are the best of all worlds and then from people I hear they kill your rotors. When you look at the bullets on Tirerack for the both pads, they have the same points.

Ceramics:
http://www.tirerack.com/brakes/brake...ar=&perfCode=P
Key Features & Benefits of Hawk Performance Ceramic Brake Pads

* Ultra-low dust
* Improved braking over OE
* Stable friction output
* Extremely quiet
* Extended pad life
* Increased rotor life

HPS:
http://www.tirerack.com/brakes/brake...ar=&perfCode=S
Key Features and Benefits of Hawk Performance HPS Brake Pads:

* High friction/torque hot or cold
* Gentle on rotors
* Very quiet, low noise
* Improved braking over OE pads
* Extended pad life

Hmmm....

[TROLL]

well in that case i havent really heard about the ceramics.
if i were to guess the ceramics are like an OE replacement, with priorities being long life and low dust, whereas the HPS is more of a performance upgrade with reasonable dust, noise, etc. but also a good improvement on performance as well.
so i'd say it probably depends on how concerned you are with improving your braking performance from what i know of these two options.

[03sLoMaX]

i have the HPS pads on my maxima and i love them...they dont make to much noise and the dust isnt that bad either as long as you wash your car every so often.

[HsOffRoad]

It mainly boils down to 2 things... One, how hot are you going to get your brakes (and furthermore, how often do you get them hot), and how much do you feel like wearing out your rotors. I do not have specific experience with these 2 Hawk pads (though they probably are just someone else's compound sold off as their own)... it really dosen't matter because it all comes down to the same thing in the end.

In general, the harder pads are going to resist fade and self-destruct less in prolonged high-heat applications, but will work very poorly until they are warmed up. They are also generally louder, and they tear the rotor up much quicker since they are made from a much harder compound.

If you aren't tracking the car, I recommend you run the softer compound of the 2. Ask for information on the compounds and compare them to other compunds on the market (Like I said, you'll probably find it's someone else's compound re-badged as Hawk, but regardless...) Check out some of the compounds from Wilwood (www.wilwood.com), EBC (www.ebcbrakes.com), etc... Look at the numbers for their products and compare them to the pads in question. You may have to dig a little to get hold of the right info, but trust me it is available (brakes are important on race cars). I can tell you from experience, EBC "green stuff" pads work quite well on daily driven vehicles, and will allow some more spirited driving without sacrificing your cold-stopping much at all. Compounds harder than that (Like the EBC "Red Stuff"), are going to allow you to track the car more aggresively, but with noticable reduction in cold-breaking, as well as decreased rotor life. Compunds with numbers harder than the "Red Stuff" should be left for track-only applications (regardless of what they say).

Hope that helps...

Hans

[olsookie]

hawk hps pads are great, i had them on my last evo, i just ordered the hawk ceramic pads for my car now, i would be able to let you know very very shortly how they compare.

[SexyDSM95]

Just remember the con to cermaic pads. They eat away at your rotors, IMHO I would stick to something along the lines of Axxis, Hawk, etc. metallic pads. Or even look into carbon kevlar

I have the EBC Green Stuff pads and their website specifically states if you over 200WHP that you should upgrade to the Red pads (also more $$$). I have also not seen a difference in brake dust with these pads compared to the Axxis pads I had on before. I am going to try Carbon Kevlar very soon to complete the brake cycle

[PotenzaSub]

a quote from Fox news yesterday: "...becuase you don't know whether the guy you are buying break pads from is a mechanic or...or Hezbolla."

LOl. they were discussing how terrorist groups counterfiet everyday things to make money

[specVogel]

go with the hawk hps pads. for a daily driver you dont really want ceramic pads. ceramic tends to be noisey until they are heated up properly and they wear the rotors quicker. i have the hps pads and they stop great and dont make any noise at all.

[highmilehatch]

Axxis Ultimates or Hawk HPS.

[SmokeyBandit]

Hawk Ceramic aren't as grabby HPS

[InfiniteMotors]

Carbotechs are similar to hawks, I have bobcats and love them

they take about one half stomping to warm up and after that they'll put my nose in the steering wheel