Rotors

I was just wondering if anyone can explain the pros and cons of drilled rotors, slotted rotors, and both cross-drilled and slotted rotos? what would be good for a daily driver? thanks, any specific brands?

Under hard braking, things get hot (duh) as braking is really just tranferring kinetic energy into heat energy. The more kinetic energy you have (the faster you are moving), the more heat will be produced to slow you down. When conventional brake pads get really hot they release gasses, these gasses can interfere with the pads contact with a solid rotor, and susequently the pads won't grip very well (this is know as "brake fade"). This intense heat from braking can also warp the rotors, causing the pads to not fit properly, and therefor the brakes will not be using 100% of the pads surface area.

Cross drilled and slotted rotors provide a means of evacuating the interfering gasses from in between the pads and rotors, they also help cool the rotors, allowing passage for cool air across the rotor. This combined effect helps create a more fade resistant braking system and a more warp resistant rotor...better all around brakes.

As for which is better, both are good, and if you are SERIOUS about braking then buy the cross drilled and slotted rotors. I stumbled upon this (http://www.deepstaged.net/stop_it.htm) site, which further explains the advantages of each.

Most pads these days don't really release gas, so cross drilling isnt really necessary, but slotting can be helpful, as it does the same job, and more, but requires no holes completely through the rotor. Also, cross-drilled rotors is detrimental to its cooling. Slotting is good enough, especially for street, although cross drilling looks cool :)

Drilled and slotted rotors especially slotted rotors provide better resistance to fading - do you often fade your brakes?

By fading I mean that your brakes seem to weaken towards the end of your commute especially after intense stop and go stretch.

If you do than both slotted and drilled would resist fading. Slotting makes more sense because it vents gases without taking away mass from the rotor. More mass means better ability to take away heat from the pad rotor contact area.

If you like to look of drilled rotors but want the best performance than you want to consider dimpled rotors as they give the appearance of slotted rotors would losing mass.

Please go to the following link to see what's available:


http://www.tirerack.com/a.jsp?a=DY2&url=/brakes/index.jsp

thanks for replying, i'll check out theses sites

There are a lot of opinions on which is better. Most opinions are against the cross-drilled. I have personally used the Brembo cross-drilled with good success (on my current Supra), but have heard and seen other people have problems with them cracking. I don't think you can go wrong with the slotted rotors and then have no worries about cracking...
Good luck,
Daniel