I used to have the same problem with mine until I did this. Carbon Metallic pads from Autozone with the cheapest rotors you can find. For me Advance was cheaper than Autozone. Make sure you bed them properly, and I never had a problem with them. Even after wearing the pads down to like 1/8th inch they never wobbled at all.

 

Myself I have ceramic pads all around and the rotors are just whatever the guy at NAPA gave me. I told him I didn't want anything expensive when I went in. Been on the car two years now and no problems with them. I only warped on rotor, which was because I was in a hurry at work and used an air gun with a torque stick. It warped the one rotor. I turned it down and still fine. When you first start using them, you need to heat them gradually for the first little while. This will break them in basically.

 

Another thing to think about is... Are your read drums in asjustment? If they are out of wack, your front rotors are doing almost all the stopping. I did the Rear Disk swap on my 2000 and I have never wrapped a set of rotors since. BUt then again, I'm assuming that you have drums.

 

I'm still on full stock brakes that have never been replaced, and mine have never warped, so I guess breaking in and balancing is required for when you put in new ones.

 

I did warp a couple of sets, but then got a torque wrench and have been re torquing my lug nuts whenever anyone does anything to the car. I always notice that they sometimes get a little loose after the initial tightening. Sometimes I have to it three times before they're stable. Haven't warped since. I did all the other stuff too about breaking them in slowly and all that and they also warped before retorquing lug nuts.

 

Breaking them in slowly is a myth. I have ALWAYS bedded my pads by doing 3 hard stops from 60 to 30, and then 3 more from 45 to 25. After that you drive around for about 10 minutes to cool off the rotors. I've never had a problem using this method. It cures the pads and heats them to the point that it releases all of the gases from the bonding material in the pads. That is part of what causes brake fade. It is extremely important that if you use this method that you cool the pads by driving sanely and trying not to stop completely on the pads while they are still hot. That will deposit brake material on the rotors and cause what a lot of people think is warped rotors, but it's really just a buildup of brake material on the rotor.

 

To add.... if you pull over and stop on the side of the road or in a parking lot, you can let the car sit out of gear with your foot off the brake pedal. That will not get any hot deposits to stick to the rotor, which is what actually happens when you guys call it "warping".

 

In the past I would have considerable brake warping issues on my venture. I mean they wouldn't even last 15,000kms without warping. Finally got tired of going to the garage to get them changed and started doing it myself. Not one problem since then. There are two main factors I think that helped. First, I buy only the premium rotors. As I understand it, the standard rotors at most auto supply places use cheap steel (more impurities, porosity...etc). The other factor, I properly torque down the lug nuts using a torque wrench and not an impact gun.
I went from spending $300+ a year at a shop for front end brakes to less than $150 every two to three years doing it myself!!
I've only had the bull for about a year and so far no brake warping issues.

 

To add.... if you pull over and stop on the side of the road or in a parking lot, you can let the car sit out of gear with your foot off the brake pedal. That will not get any hot deposits to stick to the rotor, which is what actually happens when you guys call it "warping".
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I use the parking brake for that a lot.

 

The biggest factor is the quality of the pads and how they are used. Most brake rotor "warpage" is pad material on the surface of the rotor. A few very hard stops every now and then will clean them off with some aggressive pads.

 

The biggest factor is the quality of the pads and how they are used. Most brake rotor "warpage" is pad material on the surface of the rotor. A few very hard stops every now and then will clean them off with some aggressive pads.
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In fact, thats usually what it is, is uneven pad material buildup. Once it starts to get bad to the point that you notice vibration or slight shaking, it is usually toast for those rotors. Even once you get them turned, the super heated pad material that builds up forms an extremely super hardened compound that will never really go away, that is why having the rotors turned is sometimes only a temporary several month fix.

Generally what gets the rotors "warped" or have this uneven buildup is standing on hot brakes at a stoplight.

Unfortunately with our automatics (well I guess those lucky enough to have MTX SHO's this doesn't apply to as much) we have to step on the brake some because of the "creep" unless we put it into neutral at the stop light. Sometimes after coming to a hard stop off a downhill off-ramp from 75 mph, parking, and putting the parking brake on hard can do the same to the rear rotors.

What happens here is the brakes are still hot and the pads end up transferring material to the rotor at a dead stop, in one spot.


What I do when I have hot brakes and hit a red light

1.) if I absolutely cant move any, I put it into neutral and dont apply any brake pressure if i can, or as little as possible to keep the car from rolling. If I can slowly roll backward or forward, I do. when I do this I always look in the rearview mirror and watch for cars pulling up behind, because if you are in neutral without your foot on the brake not paying attention and someone taps you, its their fault, but when you roll into the guy in front of you or into the intersection, its your fault.

2.) I leave it in drive, but I try to time my slowdown so the light is green by the time I get there sometimes (great on gas too), or I come to a crawl about a car length away from the guy in front of me and slowly creep with light brake pressure the entire time. I do this for two reasons, first so I know im not standing hard on the brakes, and two, to keep the hot pads moving over the rotors.



Since then, I have done some sporty driving on multiple ocassions to the point of getting them so hot I get quite nasty brake fade and turn my brake fluid brown, but never since I started doing this technique have I experienced the "warped" rotor problem.

 

Aggressive metallic pads will scour off the pad material with a few hard foot to the floor stops.

 

Brembos and performance pads...no warpage no buildup. Stay away from cheap stuff

 

Regardless of the rotors and pads that you buy, using a torque wrench to tighten your wheel nuts, and the way that you drive the car appear to be the most important factors affecting how long your rotors and pads will last.

 

....and keep your left foot off the brake pedal......

 

I never had any warpage problems since I've been using Brembo rotors with Autozone Ceramic pads. I also always use a torque wrench to tighten the lugs. I have noticed a nice improvement with my current setup compared to the OEM stuff I had. As many have already said, do some hard stops to clean the rotors. It might definitely help.