Re: [DML] Wanted: Completely different brake setup

[William T Wilson <fluffy@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sat, 12 Jun 2004, Christian Williams wrote:

> Hi all, I'm hoping that someone will be able to help me with this. My
> brakes are noisy. Unbelievably noisy. Sometimes it'll be the front
> brakes while stopping, or the parking brake pads rubbing the ever-warped
> rotors.

You ought to be able to find a pad that doesn't squeal.  But since you say 
you have tried many, perhaps not.

If the rotors are warped it may be due to improper tightening of the lugs.  
They must be hand-tightened in the proper order or the rotors can warp.  
Using an air wrench will ruin them (plus make them impossible to get off 
if you ever need to change a tire in the field).  Of course you can still 
use the air wrench to remove them.  This is the only way in which the 
DeLorean brakes are unique, they are just parts-bin brakes.  But they are 
good parts-bin brakes - when working correctly they are better than just 
about any car of the era and, other than the absence of antilock, better 
than most modern vehicles as well.

Because the brakes are so good, there aren't really any brake upgrades
available.

It is possible that your brakes are defective in some nonobvious way.  You 
might see if you can beg or borrow some new calipers - especially if one 
side has more problems than the other.

> Vented, slotted, and drilled are of course preferable, but at this
> point, I'll try anything that anyone can think of.

Drilled aren't really preferable.  Drilled rotors crack, and the original
reason for drilling rotors (to allow gas coming out of the pads to escape)
is not relevant with modern brake pads.  They are still used on
motorcycles and race cars, but this is to save weight, not to improve
braking performance.

Slotted rotors are sort of the same way, but they don't make your rotors 
crack quite so much.  The primary advantage is that they look fast.  Of 
course, unless you have aftermarket wheels, you won't even get that...




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