A couple months back my wife handed over the 01 D keys to me. The kids are older now, and so she decided on a cushy car. Well, I've always loved our "big old" Mopar, but felt it could perform better. So far I've installed a K&N filter and Bilstein shocks. While somewhat skeptical, I have to admit that the K&N and Bilsteins greatly improved the performance of my D. This weekend, I'm changing out those horrible OEM front brake rotors/pads and going with slotted rotors and Hawk pads. Next, I'll probably switch out the OEM throttle body with a Fastman TB. I’ll have spent about $1k when finished. Not bad! Any other things you D owners are doing to up the performance? Let me know.

TTM

I too considered getting slotted rotors on the front - as well as some pads that supposedly don't dust up as much. A friend of mine who seems to know his stuff said slotted and drilled rotors decrease your brake distance and all, but they eat through the pads at an increased rate. The website I looked at said that increased pad life was a benefit of slotted or drilled rotors. What's your thoughts on this discrepency?

Thanks!
Peter

I too considered getting slotted rotors on the front - as well as some pads that supposedly don't dust up as much. A friend of mine who seems to know his stuff said slotted and drilled rotors decrease your brake distance and all, but they eat through the pads at an increased rate. The website I looked at said that increased pad life was a benefit of slotted or drilled rotors. What's your thoughts on this discrepency?

Thanks!
Peter

Peter,
Here's my take on the brake issue. I have heard that drilled / slotted rotors decrease the life of the pads. That kind of makes sense when you consider that the surface of the drilled / slotted rotors create "sharp edges", parallel to the face of the pads. However, I would trade the reduced braking distance for the reduced pad life, any day! Then again, it could be argued that the d/s rotors dissipate heat better, thus prolonging pad life. Either way you look at it, the OEM brakes on the D's are under-designed. Any upgrade to the brakes would be an improvement.
BTW, I have heard that slotted rotors are better than the drilled ones, because the drilled rotors have the tendency to crack, due to heat generated stress risers between the holes. The bottom line is, I've installed the slotted rotors along with the "Hawk" pads, and have seen a tremendous improvement to the D's braking performance. Oh yea, and the brake dust is minimal. Hope my commentary helps.

Regards,

TTM

now that I've heard of someone doing this on a durango I'll go ahead and try it myself. My ABS module is dead (ROM Checksum error) so I don't have ABS until I pay the dealer $1300 for that repair - I figure anything I can do to inexpensively improve my standard brakes makes sense.
Have you thought about taking the rear drum brakes off and replacing those with slotted rotors as well?
Peter

No, not really. I've read somewhere here on the forum that it's a very expensive retrofit. If I were you, I'd seriously consider getting the ABS problem resolved, before I persued any other brake mods. Be careful!