Aftermarket or OEM Brakepads

[glorifiedpower]

They say OEM's don't last long,

Aftermarket or OEM Brakepads?

Thank You

[cofetym]

2005 pilot front disc brakes

Lots of info if you do a quick search.

[BoilermakerFan]

Depends on what you're looking for. I love EBC brake pads. I had a 2000 Jetta GLX and a 2004 Audi A4 before our Pilot that we just bought on Sat.

Jetta's are notorious for going through rear rotors and pads, but the EBC Greenstuff pads lasted 50% longer than the OE pads. I put Greenstuff pads on my A4 at 700 miles because the stock pads sucked (about twice the stopping distance of the stock Pilot). The A4 made it 81K on the rears! A4 fronts had 93K when I upgraded to slotted rotors and EBC RedStuff pads for even more stopping power.

Our Pilot has 43K and a noticeable shudder from warped OE rotors. I'm planning to go with EBC USR rotors, EBC GreenStuff Supreme front pads and the Green Stuff Sport rear pads with the USR rotors. The Greenstuff pads improve braking by 10-15% over OE on OE rotors and with the slotted rotors it's closer to 30% improvement. I plan to start towing and I just like having the maximum braking I can without changing the calipers and hangers. If they only last 40K, but I can avoid one accident that I may not have on stock brakes, then they paid for themselves. EBC GreenStuff pads are lower dust than OE too, a nice feature over most aftermarket pads.

I have the EBC part numbers for the standard OE replacement Sport rotors as well as the USR rotors along with the pad part numbers if you want them.

[sjlee]

Originally Posted by glorifiedpower

They say OEM's don't last long,

Aftermarket or OEM Brakepads?

Thank You

I had the rear pads replaced on our Pilot at about 60k miles, but still have the original front pads.

I'm pretty happy with that longevity, so I'd probably go with OEM again.

[cofetym]

This is not my first 4 wheel disc vehicle but usually you'll replace several front brake pads before the rear ones.

[BoilermakerFan]

Depends on the vehicle and road conditions. Jettas eat through rears three times faster than fronts on average and Audi was about 2:1 rears to fronts on average. My 83K rears were a record for Audi to their knowledge, but 70K of the miles were interstate cruising. The more winter driving in snow with sand and salt, the faster the rears will go because of the additional wear from the stuff kicking up by the front tires.

My dealer told me the Pilot should go 40K-50K and both should wear evenly. I bought my 2006 Pilot used last Saturday and it had a slight shudder, so I know the front rotors are warped. Price we paid reflected the need for brakes since my salesman knew I would use aftermarket. I'll do the fronts first, then the rears next month.

[leo38cheng]

Originally Posted by BoilermakerFan

Depends on the vehicle and road conditions. Jettas eat through rears three times faster than fronts on average and Audi was about 2:1 rears to fronts on average. My 83K rears were a record for Audi to their knowledge, but 70K of the miles were interstate cruising. The more winter driving in snow with sand and salt, the faster the rears will go because of the additional wear from the stuff kicking up by the front tires.

My dealer told me the Pilot should go 40K-50K and both should wear evenly. I bought my 2006 Pilot used last Saturday and it had a slight shudder, so I know the front rotors are warped. Price we paid reflected the need for brakes since my salesman knew I would use aftermarket. I'll do the fronts first, then the rears next month.

Boiler,

i just brought an 07 last saturday too and feel that the honda brakes don't have really good stopping power. are 06 and 07 brake part numbers the same? what kind of combination would you suggest me to get for my 07 if i want REALLY REALLY good stopping power. Also would u use slotted rotor on your pilot?

[BoilermakerFan]

Originally Posted by leo38cheng

Boiler,

i just brought an 07 last saturday too and feel that the honda brakes don't have really good stopping power. are 06 and 07 brake part numbers the same? what kind of combination would you suggest me to get for my 07 if i want REALLY REALLY good stopping power. Also would u use slotted rotor on your pilot?

What's the budget?

Completely over the top:

Upgrade to Mugen forged super light 17" or 18" wheels and go with a custom big brake kit from StopTech and go with General HTS, Goodyear TripleTreds, or Yok Geolanders. Which ever weighs the least amount. Get the sprung weight as low as possible.

Next step down:

Find a set of lightweight 17" wheels under 20 pounds each you like. Then see if the 2007 MDX SH AWD brake caliper hangers fit. If the do swap over, which they should but I haven't confirmed, use EBC's Ultimate dimpled and slotted rotors for the 13" SH AWD fronts with EBC Yellow Stuff Kevlar race pads. Use stock Pilot Ulimated slotted rotors on the rear with Green Stuff pads.

That increases the OD of the front rotors by over 3/4" of inch and the Yellow stuff pads are EBCs race pads or large SUV proved braking pad. Both the pads and rotors will wear a LOT faster and it's a $350-$400 set for pads and rotors.


Reasonable maximum stopping:

Keep the 16" size but go lighter wheel and lightest great braking tire out. Run stock size EBC Ultimate slotted rotor and Yellows in front with slotted and Greens in the rear.

Well improved, but reduced wear option is the same as stock above but use GreenStuff Ultimate pads on the front instead of yellows.

However, a key factor are tires and their braking ability. Better brakes with crappy tires really nueters the gains. I plan to go with an Axis wheel which is 17" but 3 pounds lighter than stock. Tire weight goes up 5 pounds so gain 2 pounds over stock at the wheels, but the sidewalk will stiffer and a larger contact area. The GY TTs and General HTS both have very good braking in dry and wet. I'll be running slotted stock size Pilot rotors until I get the new wheels and see if the bigger SH-AWD caliper hangers work. If they do, I'll bump up to bigger rotors, but I plan to use the GreenStuff Ultimate pads instead of the more aggressive Yellows in front.

Personally, while StopTechs are bad ass, they would look out of place on a Pilot. If you wanted a little more boy racer look, paint the stock caliper red or black.

[leo38cheng]

Originally Posted by BoilermakerFan

What's the budget?

Completely over the top:

Upgrade to Mugen forged super light 17" or 18" wheels and go with a custom big brake kit from StopTech and go with General HTS, Goodyear TripleTreds, or Yok Geolanders. Which ever weighs the least amount. Get the sprung weight as low as possible.

Next step down:

Find a set of lightweight 17" wheels under 20 pounds each you like. Then see if the 2007 MDX SH AWD brake caliper hangers fit. If the do swap over, which they should but I haven't confirmed, use EBC's Ultimate dimpled and slotted rotors for the 13" SH AWD fronts with EBC Yellow Stuff Kevlar race pads. Use stock Pilot Ulimated slotted rotors on the rear with Green Stuff pads.

That increases the OD of the front rotors by over 3/4" of inch and the Yellow stuff pads are EBCs race pads or large SUV proved braking pad. Both the pads and rotors will wear a LOT faster and it's a $350-$400 set for pads and rotors.


Reasonable maximum stopping:

Keep the 16" size but go lighter wheel and lightest great braking tire out. Run stock size EBC Ultimate slotted rotor and Yellows in front with slotted and Greens in the rear.

Well improved, but reduced wear option is the same as stock above but use GreenStuff Ultimate pads on the front instead of yellows.

However, a key factor are tires and their braking ability. Better brakes with crappy tires really nueters the gains. I plan to go with an Axis wheel which is 17" but 3 pounds lighter than stock. Tire weight goes up 5 pounds so gain 2 pounds over stock at the wheels, but the sidewalk will stiffer and a larger contact area. The GY TTs and General HTS both have very good braking in dry and wet. I'll be running slotted stock size Pilot rotors until I get the new wheels and see if the bigger SH-AWD caliper hangers work. If they do, I'll bump up to bigger rotors, but I plan to use the GreenStuff Ultimate pads instead of the more aggressive Yellows in front.

Personally, while StopTechs are bad ass, they would look out of place on a Pilot. If you wanted a little more boy racer look, paint the stock caliper red or black.

Boiler, thanks for all your advice but there's so much that you gave me that it's a bit overwhelming. Maybe i'll just wait for you to do what you're going to do and then see if I can put the acura calipers on it. PLEASE KEEP US POSTED

also do you still have your uhaul trailer hitch kit for sale? can you give me some pictures of your OLD trailer hitch compare to your NEW OEM trailer hitch? THANKS!

btw. if I just want to stick to simple looking wheels and some nice pads to INCREASE MY braking power, what should I look for? how does the wheel/tire size affect the ride and handling of the car? what is stock wheel size?

thank boiler!!!
-Leo

[BoilermakerFan]

Originally Posted by leo38cheng

Boiler, thanks for all your advice but there's so much that you gave me that it's a bit overwhelming. Maybe i'll just wait for you to do what you're going to do and then see if I can put the acura calipers on it. PLEASE KEEP US POSTED

also do you still have your uhaul trailer hitch kit for sale? can you give me some pictures of your OLD trailer hitch compare to your NEW OEM trailer hitch? THANKS!

btw. if I just want to stick to simple looking wheels and some nice pads to INCREASE MY braking power, what should I look for? how does the wheel/tire size affect the ride and handling of the car? what is stock wheel size?

thank boiler!!!
-Leo

Yes, the U-Haul hitch is still on my Pilot. Planning to replace it soon, by mid-November. We can move that to PMs.

The three main keys to improving braking performance are shedding weight at the wheels and tires, improving the leverage of the brakes by the larger rotors and more aggressive pads, and by improving the performance of the tires by buying tires that brake better in dry or wet conditions as well as increasing the contact area the tire has with the road.

Some of these keys can work against each other, such as larger tires weigh more. The larger tire contact patch also works against you in deeper snow and for fuel economy.

Stock wheel is a 16" x 6.5" wide with 45mm offset. Stock tire size is 235/70-16.

Assuming stock 16" wheels, the only ways to improve braking is to use more aggressive brake pads, add slotted rotors with the new pads, or new tires that are as light as possible while still maintaining very good wet and dry braking. These tires are the General Grabber HTS and the Continental CrossContact LX... The Goodyear TripleTreds were only rated average for braking.

Stock wheels weigh 23 pounds, but the OE Goodyear tires only weighed 27 pounds each. The Bridgestone Duelers were 30 pounds each. So right off the bat with stock wheels, were adding weight with the better tires since they weigh 32 or 33 pounds each.

The latest Consumer Reports chart is in the Grabber HTS thread:
Grabber HTS

The tires that are on my Pilot are Firestone Destination LEs in 235/70-16. You can see where they rank with Consumer Reports. I think CS was too kind. They are loud tires. They weigh 35 pounds for the stock 16" tire! And horrible rolling resistance, so they sucked 2mpg off the Pilot. Fortunately they will be going sooner than later, they're tread life was a solid black dot which means piss poor.

I love the EBC GreenStuff pads. They are a more aggressive, but long wearing, low dust pad compared to my old OE pads on Audi and VWs.

Pads alone on stock rotors are a 5-15% improvement in braking. Replace the stock rotors with a slottled or slotted and dimpled rotor (avoid cross-drilled rotors on a heavy SUV, they will crack) and the total gain goes up to 15%-30% improvement, plus much greater resistance to brake fade.

Brake fade was horrible on my stock Audi A4 and the first pass braking sucked too. Just the pad change and proper bedding of the pad and rotor was huge on that car.



Moving to aftermarket wheels:

The recommended tire size for 17" wheels is 235/65-17 to maintain the same overall OD so the speedometer will remain as accurate as it is stock. I will go to 245/65-17 and add a little more width to the tire patch and my speedo will read a little low, maybe 1-2mph.

So my goal is to go with aftermarket 17" Axis Sport wheels which weigh 19.5 pounds each and 245/65/17 tires to add a little contact area, but they only have a 1 pound weight penalty over the 16 tires so my combo would weigh 52.5 or 53.5 pounds with the Grabber HTS or Continental CCs. A little more than the OE setup with GYs or break even with the OE stock wheels and Duelers.

Hopefully the 17" wheels add enough clearance for the larger MDX SH-AWD rotor too, which will be a 1-2 pound weight gain at each wheel, but so much more leverage they braking will improve measurably. I just need to confirm what the SH-AWD wheel size was in 2007.



Going to 18" wheels, while looking great, will have a negative effect on braking performance. There is a significant weight jump on the wheels in most cases and the tire weights go from 32-33lbs to 34-36lbs. So you could add anywhere from 5 pounds to as much as 14 pounds of moving, sprung weight. The added contact area will just not be able overcome the mass gain. The slotted rotors and YellowStuff pads become necessary just to maintain stock level braking performance unless the Acura TSX SH-AWD or whatever sport version 18" wheel is very light. A 25 pound wheel with a 34 pound tire is still a 6-9 pound hit over OE weights.


Did that help clarify? WRT to just adding pads to your Pilot now, my dealer would not install aftermarket pads on the stock used rotors. They would install them with my aftermarket rotors or with new Honda OE rotors. Might as well get the better aftermarket Pilot rotors if your dealer tells you the same thing, but if you have less than 30K on your OE rotors, they may install the pads for you and turn the OE rotor. Oh, I'm also planning to have my brake fluid replaced with new fluid when my pads and rotors are done. If the S2000 uses a different fluid and it's compatible with the Pilot (which it should be) I will use the S2000 fluid since it will likely be a higher performance, higher temp rated fluid.

[BoilermakerFan]

Originally Posted by leo38cheng

how does the wheel/tire size affect the ride and handling of the car?
-Leo

Missed this one. There is a lot of info on that subject buried in the W&T threads here, but I'll give you the boiled down version.

These are generalizations! This is assuming the tire is in the correct ratio to keep a nearly stock OD and on a correctly sized and offset wheel so there are no changes to the suspension geometry or clearance issues.

The shorter the side wall height, the stiffer the tire, the firmer the ride and the better the tire will handle. This can make a vehicle feel more sporty and "tight" or it can make the ride unbearably stiff and jarring. The tire side wall is a large part of the ride comfort and assists the suspension in absorbing road impacts and vibrations.

The wider the tire width, the more grip you have on dry pavement and the better dry braking (assuming no weight changes). In rain, a wider tire will generally be more prone to hydroplane than the same tire in a narrower width. A narrower tire generally does better in deep snow too. A wider tire has more friction which is why the braking improves, but it's a hit to fuel efficiency.

So the stock 16" tires with their narrow and tall profile will generally have the smoothest, quietest ride but have worse braking performance than a Pilot with 19" wheels and 255/50-19 tires. The 19" wheels and tires will be the firmest or harshest ride, but it will feel the most sporty car like in the curves. Gas mileage and acceleration with 19" will be worse on both counts too. If the weight of the 19" wheels and tires goes up significantly, which in most cases will be 10-15 pounds or more over stock OE sized 16", then the braking performance on stock pads and rotors will be worse too.

Under normal driving the change in acceleration and braking will be noticeable, but it will be even more noticable during an emergency situation.

I know a lot of Pilot owners have 19" and 20" wheels and say they are fine, with "little" changes to the ride, acceleration, or braking, but the real numbers will be far worse. The 19" wheels could add 15 feet or more to the stopping distance from 60mph. Add a mediocre tire selection and it just gets worse.

I was all set to get a set of sweet Enkei 18" wheels, but then I noticed the wheels weighed 29 pounds a piece (shipping weight was 38 pounds each) and the tires weigh 34 pounds. That was a 13 pound per wheel jump in sprung weight over stock. That's 25% more weight at each corner! So, my favorite potential wheel on my Pilot will never be seen on the vehicle. I realized I could get a great 17" wheel at a weight savings over stock with a great compromise in handling, braking, LRR tire for gas mileage, and a custom look too.

[sjlee]

Can a mod please ban this guy? He's posting the same links in multiple threads.

[colorider]

Originally Posted by sjlee

Can a mod please ban this guy? He's posting the same links in multiple threads.

Done............

[sjlee]

Originally Posted by colorider

Done............