Best Place to Source Quality Brakes

[Chad989of2000]

Hey guys, Just looking for a reputable vendor/place to purchase a full brake kit for the Galant. Nothing crazy...stock fitment...slotted is fine. Looking for EBC/Stoptech. Spirited driving maybe light track work will be as much as the car sees at stock power levels.

Looking all over and I can really only find front kits...no rears. Is this due to the integrated e-brake crap we have going on back there?

Anyone got any solid leads on where to source an entire matching set?

Thanks in advance!

 

[CutlassJim]

I usually buy individual pieces myself.

RockAuto has 6 different brand "stock" rear rotors listed.

The Raybestos R-line, which have proven to be nice long lasting brakes on other cars, are only $9.22 per rotor.

 

[Chad989of2000]

Thanks for the heads up. I was on Rockauto.com but only checking rotor and pad kits. Waaaaay more options under individual parts. Thanks again.

 

[iceman69510]

I recently purchased some of the Powerstop brand rotors from Rock Auto. Seem to be decent quality.

Also used their brake pads on my Ram truck and they came with new hardware, fit well and work fine so far.

 

[KiNgMaRtY]

I had Stoptech in an Evo a few times and always hated them. I really like Porterfield R4-S. I've had them in various cares and are great for DD/ mountain roads. My Galant with R4-S out braked my Evo with Stoptechs. I know if wasn't a bad batch either because I got them twice and one on the Miata. I would rate them on par with some Autozone basic pads.

 

[CutlassJim]

I had the opposite experience with Stoptechs. I did Supra brakes on my GS430 with Stoptech street pads and rotors and the braking was amazing. The problem I've had with all Stoptech/Centric pads though is that I drive 3-5 cars depending and when one sits with their pads it leaves material on the rotor almost immediately and then you have a pulsating peddle.

I just redid the 5 yo brakes on my 535 that were all Centric parts. Didn't drive it one winter 2 years ago and it's had a pulsation ever since. The amazing part was I still had over half of the pad thickness left. And that's with 35k miles on them in a 500hp 4000lb car.

Been rocking the Raybestos stuff for 2 years now after trying them on cheap cars just to get them going and they hold up great to spirited driving and don't care about sitting.

This is all street use of course.

 

[gvr4ever]

I have power stop stuff on my Celica and I had that problem after washing my wheels and calipers really well. The surface rust caused the pads to stick and they had a pulsating when braking, but I braked kind of hard and it went away pretty quickly. I have slotted rotors, so maybe that helped too, but it was clearly just material build up.

 

[mk2davis]

FWIW, I just bought some StopTech slotted rotors from bestbrakes.com to replace some cross drilled rotors that started to crack. These were ordered yesterday, so I cannot comment of shipping time or the parts themselves. The price was $160/pair shipped, which seems to be the going rate for these rotors.

The rotors will be mated to Hawk Street 5.0 pads. I've heard good things about Porterfield RS-4, but I couldn't find them in my search.

I know I could have gone less expensive, but after a hard canyon drive I'm tired of being the stinky one. On one specific road, I'd roast what I have pretty good. I have no idea what they are anymore. I wish I could you to stay away from ___________, but I can't.

 

[gvr4ever]

Looks like carid.com has EBS pads and rotors, as well as stop tech and a few others. Slotted\drilled rotors work on my Celica just fine. Front's are at least 4 years old and I don't have any cracks in them at all. I have done plenty of aggressive braking, but it is also a 2500lb car. The Galant will likely be harder on that style. I just did blank rotors on the Galant last time. At the time, I was able to find slotted, but I just did blanks. Looks like more options exist today.

I've read about cheap low end drilled rotors cracking right away and being a waste of time, but that was years ago and I haven't experienced that myself, but I also didn't buy a no name from ebay either.

 

[mk2davis]

The Stop Tech slotted rotors I ordered are not available. The vendor tried to talk me into SP Performance, who I'm not familiar with, which is slotted.

I chose to go with Centric blanks from Tirerack. Although stated otherwise, they are the incorrect size. 10.1" diameter instead of 10.9".

I've mounted the Hawk 5.0 pads on my existing rotors, and the car stops like it hit a wall! I don't have enough mileage to comment on dust or brake fade.

If anyone has a lead on good slotted rotors of the correct size, I'm all ears.

 

[iceman69510]

Are you still on stock 4 bolt wheels?

 

[mk2davis]

I am on 4 bolt wheels. I ordered slotted power stops from 3 different places that offered them, but no one had them in stock and the manufacturer wasn't going to make any in the forseeable future. Hopefully Carid is a different story.

 

[mk2davis]

The hawk hp 5.0 are NOT what I was looking for. Had to stop several times on a 20 miles canyon drive to wait for them to cool down. Pedal would get a little soft, very stinky, and smoking by the end road.

The good news is my pedal never left, it just required more effort. But clearly was outside of it's weight class.

 

[vr4g63tcs]

You mentioned you had to stop several times to let the brakes cool down.

Are you on a single piston setup? Stainless steel brake lines?

I would recommend doing dual piston, make even from an 05 outlander.

 

[mk2davis]

I'm on stock wheels and rubber. Don't the outlander brakes require 16" wheels?

 

[iceman69510]

Quoting vr4g63tcs:

Are you on a single piston setup? Stainless steel brake lines?

I would recommend doing dual piston, make even from an 05 outlander.



Unless someone messed with this car, Galant VR4s came with dual piston front calipers and 276mm front rotors.

Outlander front calipers (if you get the mounting brackets) do enlarge the rotor and brake envelope, so it may require larger wheels. FWIW, the Outlander caliper bodies themselves are essentially the same as 2G Eclipse AWD, and the piston size is only about 1mm larger diameter then the GVR4 caliper pistons. The mounting brackets are what make the difference. So if you upgrade you won't get much benefit unless you do use the larger rotors as well.

I just this summer rebuilt a pair of GVR4 front calipers and a pair of '05 Outlander calipers, so pretty familiar with them (hose attachment style is different as well). I plan to use the Outlander brakes on my 98 Eclipse GST.