in the spring im installing new brakes all the way around my car and this is my first brake job ever. so im looking at two sets of pads, one set are the wagner quick stop pads and the others are the wagner thermoquiet pads. which pads are better for stopping and quiet? also i keep seeing some pads saying ceramic or semi ceramic, whats the difference?

 

Anyone,

 

Ceramic is quite popular, it's even used on a lot of newer cars as original equipment. I work at carquest so I'm not sure which wagner pads are better than the other. If you wanted to know about carquest pads however, I can help.

 

Car quest doesn't sell the Wagner brand? And I think I'm going to grab the thermoquiets but I still want to know what's the difference between the ceramic and simi ceramic

 

no not that i'm aware of anyways. we may sell them reboxed with our name on them in which case knowing what wagner calls them wouldn't help. I think our usual provider is akebono. I haven't heard of semi-ceramics to be honest, I've only heard of ceramic and semi metallic. semi-ceramic may be another name for semi-metallic pads that I just haven't heard before, in which case I would definitely recommend ceramic over semi metallic if you drive your f-body like you stole something. Honestly though it's not like picking the wrong kind is a life and death decision so I'm sure whatever you decide on will work fine.

 

i run ceramics on the 86 iroc, no issue with them.

 

I did some fairly exhaustive searching for opinions around here last year, on this subject, when I replaced my rears. Stock rotors and calipers, daily driver.

Hawks HPS ferro-carbon seemed to be coming out ahead, so I went with those. Worked better than the previous semi-metallics when they were new, so I changed the fronts to match too. Overall noticeably better braking - though whether from the pad material or just the fact that they're all new, who knows.

 

Doesn't matter. None of those brands, duralast, autozoo, or even factory pads can stand up to any kind of abuse. Good for one hard stop only.

None of them are "better", I'd just get the ones with the 'low dusting" blurb and lifetime warranty unless you are actually going to look at performance brake pads.

 

The Hawks pads are a good street/track pad for a car that doesn't see much duty. Won't leave you high and dry in a track session as compared to a normal store bought pad which will give up after 1-2 laps.

 

I am running Stop Tech Street Performance brake pads: http://www.brakewarehouse.com/stopte...brake-pads.asp

The performance is amazing, really. They work well and quiet, surprisingly. Quieter than the other pads I got with Ed Miller's LS1 front brake kit, and more performant. There may be a slight increase in dust but hardly noticeable if any. And I have NOT taken it to the track but have driven it hard on the street for long periods of time and there seems to be no brake fade from as far as I can tell.

 

Agreed, having worked in auto parts stores and now installing some of their stuff on my own car, I haven't noticed any benefit in AC Delco vs. Duralast Gold vs. Raybestos, etc. All of them seem to work fine for American and Japanese daily drivers.

 

Exactly, daily street driving will NEVER expose the weak points in these pads. But once trip to a road course and you'll discover quickly just how lack-luster the braking performance is.

I know they are expensive, but the next time I do brakes on my G6 its getting Hawks HPS pads. I had the G6 at Road America and I boiled the fluid and glazed the pads in about 2.5 laps at speed. They simply couldn't handle the abuse.

 

ceramics are the best way to go. semi metallic's are less resistent to heat, cause more brake dust and wear down rotors faster. Ceramics holds up better and very very little dust