dirtengineer

98 2500 club cab 4X4 - need new rotors. The O'reilly specials warped bad in about a year. What brand of rotors does everyone recommend?

1-2-3

Driving thru deep water or some/alot of hard braking can/will warp any rotors.

JoshBrown

Rotors don't actually warp. A buildup of the wear of the pads on the rotor unevenly gives the warped feeling. Break in your pads properly.

1-2-3

Rotors do warp. Called runnout.

infidel

Highest quality rotors I've found at a decent price are Brembo from www.tirerack.com
Italian, not the cheap Chinese junk flooding the market.
My friend who has owned a brake only shop for forty years told me he usually only used Brembos on high end sports cars and was amazed at tire rack's price.

Heavy braking followed by sitting at a traffic light with the brake applied is a sure recipe for warping rotors. The area of the rotor where the pads are contacting cool slower than the rest of the rotor = warp.

wdimig

advanced rotor technology(ART), do a search, they are stock sized rotors that are slotted, and cryo treated, i picked up a set of them, and carbon metallic pads from diesel manor, so far the best rotor i have had on my truck, i have had them on for say 5k miles, and i can still see the machining cross hatch marks, a stock rotor would have already worn past those marks by now, im pretty impressed so far, we will see how long they last.

Wes

KATOOM

Disc brakes can take extreme heat, which is the reason for higher DOT fluid ratings, so the brake fluid doesn't boil. The reason disc brake rotors warp is because people ride their brakes, brake late, brake hard, and then dont allow the brakes to cool before stopping and staying stopped (parking). But then heat soak in the brake pads causes the metallurgy of the contacting portion of the rotor to alter. Basically spot heat treating which leaves soft and hard spots on the surface of the rotor. So then as the rotor wears down, the soft spots wear faster than the hard spots causing the warping. Also depending on the level of abuse the rotor has experienced, the rotors metal quality, and how deep the chemical alteration has occurred, turning the rotor may only smooth out the warp temporarily because the rotor will still wear the same way and allow the warped surface to return.

Silver R/T

http://brakeperformance.com/site/bra...ping&dv=051410

bcbigfoot

That is myth, rotors don't warp they can however wear unevenly. The uneven wear is due usally from getting the rotor very hot (downhill or emergency stop) and stopping at a stop light or such. The brake pad material is deposited/burned on more heavily were the pad touches the rotor. If you were to sand the rotor after this you would get no uneven wear (brake/rotor companies don't want you to know this). Most don't however, and continue to drive with a spot of extra brake material on the rotor, this spot gets hotter than the rest of the rotor, causing the carbon to migrate to the surface of the rotor. Hi carbon steel is very hard and doesn't wear as much as the rest of the rotor. Your runout is from wear not warping.

To the original poster stop slaming on the binders and coming to a complete stop, plan ahead a little and inche ahead when you can. The other thing you can do is buy the heaviest rotors you can, take a scale with you to the parts store (no kidding I buy batteries this way as well) more mass means it takes longer for the rotors to get to critcal temps that may cause pads to burn to rotor. Also it is just as or even more imprortant to get a good brake pad that can withstand high heat as to get some expensive rotor and poor brake pad.

67HotRod

And dont forget the brake hardware. Its like $12 for a kit to do both sides...

15 Digger

Correct, After reading brake article In TDR magazine I gained a new understanding of brakes and It made sense.

dirtengineer

Thanks for the posts so far. I am pretty sure it is the quality of the new rotors that I installed last year, and not driving habits. The original lasted almost 90k and the rotors I have now are either warped, developed runout, uneven wear, brake deposit, whatever you want to call it. I have a manual tranny, and I typicaly drive like grandma. I live in a place with snow six months of the year, so mashing of brakes will get you killed.

I am interested in this pad break in. That is something new to me. How about elaborating on that.

bcbigfoot

What is the quality/type of pads that tend to be more important than rotors. The other thing it could be does your truck sit for extended periods, rusty rotors or pads with a fair bit of metal can cause issues, even a few weeks with some salt can do it.

wdimig

"bedding" in a new rotor is critical to it's service life, if you didn't do that with the set that is on your truck then that is most likey a good reason why they have already developed run out, it's pretty simple, once you get the new rotors on, take the truck out for a drive, you want to immediately make a series of hard stops from about 50-60mph down to almost zero(DO NOT COME TO A COMLETE STOP!), do this 3 times within a 2-3min. period, the 3 hard stops will get the brakes pretty hot, and it actually leaves a even layer of brake material on the rotor, after that you want to just drive the truck for at least 10-15min. without stopping to let the brakes cool down. this is very critical also, if you stop, there is a good chance you can leave a larger buildup of material on that one spot, and you have already started the runout that you won't be able to reverse. if you absoluetly have to stop, try and use your e-brake to slow you down, using the e-brake has no effect on the front pads, just pay attention, and leave plenty of leave way infront of you. try and plan your route, like a highway or something were you shouldn't have to stop for a while. thats it! when you get out of the truck, take a look at the rotor through the wheel, you should see like a "bluish haze" on the rotor surface where the pad make contact, thats the layer of material that you left on the rotor. this technique applies to all brake rotors, small and large.

Wes

dirtengineer

Drive it to work every day.

So maybe I should be asking what rotor/pad combo is best, huh?