Johnhav430

This video seems to explain a little.....

When the new car dealer that sold my LS430 agreed to replace the brakes, I insisted on OE and asked for the old parts and boxes back. The OE Toyota rotors do not rust.

I did my BMW brakes with OE, and was surprised they looked grayish white out of the boxes, then I realized the pads scrape this coating away, which then looks chrome, and the rest stay coated. I literally used my fist to dislodge the originals from the hubs, after being on the car 9 1/2 yrs.

I always thought you can tell when a muffler or tire shop did the brakes on the car, because the hats are usually totally rusted. I once went for the midgrade rotors on my Maxima, with painted black hats, and they rusted within days....

mmarshall

...........and you didn't break any metacarpal or finger-bones?

SW17LS

Replaced my OE rotors on the LS with Centric Premium rotors, better in every respect. The Centric rotors and pads transformed the car's braking.

Aron9000

^ You get what you pay for with brake parts IMO. Sometimes the OEM really cheaps out on the brakes, the brakes on my first car, a 1991 Buick Regal were god awful. I think there was a successful class action lawsuit against GM for the rear brakes being so ****ty and completely under-specced for the size/weight of the car(it had 4 wheel discs). Pedal was always mushy and had a huge dead spot before the brakes grabbed.

You can never go wrong with buying better spec rotors than what the OEM specified. Sometimes they're cheaper than the inferior OEM parts you buy at the dealer.

Johnhav430

I had a small sledge, a ball peen, and a rubber mallet ready to go. When I removed the set screw, it looked as if the rotor wanted to fall off. A pound from the part of my fist by the pinkie caused it to come right off the hub. So I did the same on the other side. With Hondas I hear the set screw rusts and causes problems, and not needed. With German cars since there are no lug bolts coming out of the hubs, they are needed or the rotor will never line up so that the wheel can be reinstalled.

Not to start a flame war, but I stupidly bedded the OE BMW brakes. It dawned on me, when you buy a new car, the SA doesn't tell you to do this, they tell you to go easy. Some intelligent dude on the forum said you shouldn't bed them, there's a tag right in the OE box of pads that's intended to be hung on the rearview mirror, when the tech does the job--it says to go easy on the brakes. DOH!

I would agree that OE likely isn't the max performance, but they may be the best compromise, because it's engineered in general to not have any noise, or rust for that matter. You know those fake plastic inserts that try to make a floating caliper look like a fixed caliper? That is the opposite of me, I would never drive a car that had that. That's why some of the new cars on the road with flashy rims, and cheap brakes, I think are just not what I would have designed...

Had a discussion with the service director at the dealer that sold me the LS430. It was a GMC Buick dealer. They did the brakes as part of the sale with Lexus OE. He told me we did what we were told and that is to replace the caliper bolts and the sensor wire as well, so you'll see all those in the box. He said we're stuck in the 50's where I have to sell a customer a good/better/best, advantage, professional, OE, it's all a bunch of ****, they're ****** brake rotors! Nice guy. They also did the door actuator after the fact no charge.

edit p.s. there's a good youtube with MB rotors where the guy/tech is explaining the quality differences. Surprisingly, the mid level made by Textar, is produced in China, as was the low end. I believe the GM OE is made in China. Hey, I bought Nissan what I thought was OE, came in Nissan boxes, made in USA, and rusted in a matter of 2 mos. I think the online dealer switched them for the so called value rotors. note to self: verify part #'s again if I see black painted hats, that's not what I would generally want....the entire disc should be dipped for my tastes

mmarshall

I'm one of those who, unless one has to quickly stop to avoid an accident, firmly believe in going easy on new rotors and pads during the first 500-1000 miles for a proper break-in (like it usually says in the Owners' Manual). By doing so, on my cars, over the years, I have never had the kind of brake-noises that many others complain about. The only noise I ever get is the (normal) light-scrape for about the first two or three applications after the brakes have gotten wet and sitting for awhile (after a wash or rain) and there is a light layer of brown rust on the rotors themselves. When that happens, it takes a couple of pedal-applications for the pads to rub the rust layer off with a light scraping sound....then blessed silence.