So it's time for me to upgrade these tiny brakes to some larger 12" rotors and I'm basically looking for some input on brake pads. I hear Hawk brake pads are great for the street use, I also see advance auto carries Akebono pads which are supposedly good pads as well. The rotors will be standard blanks and not that drilled slotted shit as I drive quite a bit and don't have time to deal with them cracking. I may go with just slotted rotors but I'm not really to sure. I will be using rotors from a 04'+ Impala/Monte Carlo SS and basically using stock calipers since they are the same anyways, just the bracket is different. I don't race the car but do drive aggressively and I want to stay away from ceramic pads due to past experiences with them so metallic pads all the way unless there are some damn good ceramic pads that don't ruin rotors.

 

I wouldn't worry about slotted rotors cracking unless you're doing some serious heat cycles on them and getting them glowing hot. I've heard some pretty mixed reviews on hawk pads, some people say they are great track pads, other say they are worse them the OEM pads (for s2000's).

Anyway, unless you're doing multiple hard stops without much time in between, I'd just go with the flats. And get pads that have reviews of having very good cold bite. Because chances are you won't have them hot when you need to use them.

 

I cant wait to upgrade my front brakes, good stuff op!

 

Hawk HPS pads felt only slightly better than oem pads for me. But that may depend on your factory application.

 

hawks are hit or miss.
a lot of people love them. but it also seems like a lot of people complain about noise.
my buddy's skyline will stop nice all day long, but if he really gets on them, they will squeal like a stuck pig until they cool off completely.

I've heard a lot of good things about EBC green stuff. a step up from the stock or wearevers the part's store sells, but they act like stock pads. So you'll get good stopping out of them, good life out of them, and they are near silent.
A few of the 300zx's that I've driven have had them and I liked the way they felt. Beat the piss out of them and didn't have any issues.

 

I might give the ebc green stuff pads a go, they are relatively cheap and a lot of reviews say they are decent performance pads vs reviews about hawks being basically oem replacements.

 

Next on my list is a cam.

 

well the hawks have an OEM replacement pad and a street performance pad.
A lot of people don't know the difference and expect the cheaper oem replacement to make them stop like an indy car.
where as, people who get the EBC pads aren't expecting much out of them since they know they are getting the cheap oem replacement pad so the fact that it is any better than stock is awesome.
both the hawk pads and the ebc pads are better than what is on your car now.
most would argue that the hawk pad falls some where in between the ebc green and the ebc yellow.

hawk seems to be more hit or miss as far as noise is concerned. and personally, I would have a slotted rotor if I was going hawk as they "seem" to be made of a little bit "harder" compound.

 

This is for your Buick?

 

Yes sir, the rotors are warped and the pads are trash and it's going to cost the same to get stock rotors and pads as it would be to upgrade to larger rotors and better pads, ok so maybe like $50 more but why go stock lol.