# PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info



## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

Hello Everyone!
I was doing a little web surfing this morning (still looking for a nice low-dusting, linear street pad), and came across the following post on a Subaru forum. No idea how much of it applies to our cars, but first hand data's always nice to read about, even if it's about Subarus.







. The entire thread comes from here:
http://www.i-club.com/forums/s...85263
And the fellow making the post works for a company that maintains some interesting online technical articles:
http://www.stoptech.com/technical/
Anyway, just thought some of you might be interested. Hope you're all having a good Labor Day (or a nice ordinary Monday, if you're not in the States). Cheers!
- Ceilidh

P.S. -- Phatvw: how are things over in Washington State? Have the latest suspension & brake mods helped out in your AutoXing? Hope you're well!
.
Quote from the Subie forum:

_Quote »_
Please keep in mind that there is no such thing as a high performance street pad that will stand up to open track use on the front of a front engine car. So, unless you own a Porsche or a Ferrari, don't let me catch you at the track with a set of street pads.
With that having been said, here is a quick rundown of some quiet, high performance street pads:
Axxis Ultimate: Will make noise, especially at very low speeds and under low clamping loads, when not bedded in. Should be silent when properly bedded in thanks to integrated shims. Dusts as much as anything out there, however since the dust does not contain ferrous metals, it will not degrade the finish on wheels as long as you wipe them down every month or so. (For reference, I've gone over 6 months of hard street driving without cleaning my wheels, and had no damage to the finish of my wheels, but I do have Rotas. Cheesy stuff like Volks or Prodrive may not hold up as well. ) Ultimate exhibits excellent pad life and very low rotor wear characteristics when it is kept within its range of intended operating temperatures. Excellent fit and finish, with pad wear sensors where necessary. You'll have a tough time finding a street pad that this combination of low noise, good friction characteristics, long pad and rotor life, high MOT, and low price level as the Ultimate.
Axxis Deluxe Plus: Likely the least impressive friction characteristics of this bunch, certainly the least impressive MOT, but still an upgrade from stock and if you don’t beat the hell out of your car, you may not need the MOT that the other pads offer. These pads do have shims, but can make a little noise if they’re not bedded in. Keep them bedded and they’ll be silent. Same top notch fit and finish as Ultimate, with electronic wear sensors where necessary. The real benefit to these pads is the low dust levels, upgraded performance from OE, low pad and rotor wear rates, and pricing that’s roughly 25% less than that of Ultimate.
Hawk HPS: Damn near impossible to get this material to make noise. Certainly one of the quietest and lowest dusting HiPerf street pads around, with the possible exception of Hawk’s new Performance Ceramic compound. Gives up some in the MOT and friction level departments in order to reduce noise and greatly reduce levels of dust, but will still be an upgrade from OE pads. Compared to Ultimate, this material has almost no dust. Excellent pad and rotor wear characteristics and great fit and finish at a price that’s roughly twice that of Ultimate.
Hawk Performance Ceramic: I need to preface this one by saying that I have no personal experience with this compound since the knuckleheads at Hawk decided not to include the D372 pad shape in their first round of production. I have been told by Hawk that it will exhibit slightly better friction characteristics than HPS, have a similar MOT, have the same low noise, but with significantly less dust than HPS. Pricing is roughly 10% higher than that of HPS.
Pagid Sport Blue (RS 4-2-1 and RS 4-2-2): This pad is very similar in almost every way to Axxis Ultimate, except of course price. Great fit and finish, relatively high dust levels (not quite as high as Ultimate, but still substantial), low noise (shims included), great pad and rotor wear characteristics, SLIGHTLY (not significantly) better friction characteristics and similar MOT to Ultimate, but at roughly three times the price.
Tim Kelsch
StopTech LLC




_Modified by Ceilidh at 12:16 PM 9-5-2005_


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*


_Quote, originally posted by *Ceilidh* »_....And the fellow making the post works for a company that maintains some interesting online technical articles:
http://www.stoptech.com/technical/


Hello again,
Well, the Stoptech technical articles are certainly interesting -- here's one suggesting that many Big Brake Kits will mess up the ABS actuation, so that stopping distances with ABS-invoked can actually be longer than stock. Here's the article (unfortunately kind of long, and the punchline is towards the bottom):
http://www.stoptech.com/whitep...1.htm
Any thoughts? (Phat?)







Ceilidh


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Hello again!
Yes, I know -- kind of lame to keep replying to my own thread







, but here's some more info on street pad dust:
I spoke with Dave Zeckhausen of Zeckhausen Racing (extremely knowledgeable guy -- an engineer, with a business based solely on performance braking, who's personally tried out all the brakes he sells; very different from the some of the other vendors, who advise on the basis of ad copy or anecdotal reports....).
Anyway, I asked Dave about the relative dust between OEM, PBR/Axxis Ultimate (Ceramic), PBR/Axxis Deluxe Plus, and Hawk Performance Ceramic, and here's his rundown:
PBR/Axxis Deluxe Plus:
Almost no dust at all, very close to a "dust-free" pad; probably the most dust-free performance street pad out there; significantly less dust than Mintex Redbox; similar to OEM bite but with much less fade.
Hawk Performance Ceramic:
A little dustier than the Deluxe Plus, but far far less dust than the PBR Ultimates; somewhat better bite than Deluxe Plus.
PBR/Axxis Ultimate:
"Substantially dustier, I would call it a medium-dusting pad." Somewhat less dust than OEM, but not that different in terms of dusting; in terms of performance, by far the grippiest of the pads under discussion.
OEM:
Dustiest, lowest performance of the pads under discussion.

Anyway, I'll keep posting up info when/if I come across more first-hand experiences. Cheers!








-Ceilidh


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

And, the solo conversation continues.....








The BMW 3-series folks seem to have the same concerns as some of us: they want a pad with reasonable performance, no noise, and as little dust as possible. Here's one of their discussions:
http://forum.e46fanatics.com/s...90957
(The interesting info (for us) is from about halfway on downwards....)
Once again, it looks like Hawk Ceramic and Axxis Deluxe Plus are very close in dust and initial bite, with the Axxis DP just a little cleaner and the Hawk Ceramic a little better gripping. Hawk HPS comes next, with more dust and more bite, and then comes Axxis Ultimate with the most dust and the most bite (among Hawk Ceramic, HPS, Axxis DP, Axxis Ultimate).
Cheers folks!
- Ceilidh


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## phatvw (Aug 29, 2001)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Hey Ceilidh, looks like some interesting material you found. I'm going to have to read through it and think about it a bit before responding...

BTW, I've never autocrossed. Just road-course driving. Car is holding up fine. Just swapped out the "b" bumpstops for "c" bumpstops this weekend (thansk eggroller and traffic) and will try those out at the track. I didn't notice any difference in terms of comfort, but the added stiffness mght change the handling on the track.
I also re-lubed and cleaned up my caliper guide pins and that made the brakes feel a heck of a lot better! My review is at the bottom: http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=1479526
If you haven't cleaned those in a while, do so! Don't wait until you change your pads, just get in there with a high-quality grease.
Ooooh I also ordered a lightweight battery (11.5lbs







) since my 4-year old oem battery is on its way out and I don't think it'll survive the winter.


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

More Info; this one's specifically about PBR/Axxis Ultimates:
http://m3.madrussian.net/revie...shtml
Regarding his dusting comments, please remember that the BMW M3 stock pads dust quite a bit more than our VW brakes do -- hence the comments about the "low dust" qualities of the Ultimates don't fully apply to us (I had Ultimates on my GTI for a while, and they definitely were not "low dust" compared to my stock brakes).
But what's really interesting is the comment about brake fade, which is pretty well in line with what I (and apparently some others) have experienced, and which put in context some of the comments made in the earlier posts about how important it is to keep the Ultimates within their design temperature range. For your convenience I've repeated the fade description below:

_Quote »_
....Also, the way these communicate to the driver takes a little getting used to. The fade is not really progressive. Once their limits are met or exceeded they go from full grip to pretty noticeable fade fairly quickly and not in a gradual manner like the OEM's. It's not an on/off switch but you have to pay attention as once you exceed their limits there is not much left and they don't provide the subtle hinds that OEM and some other street pads do as how close you are to fading them into oblivion.

.
(Phat -- nice to hear from you! Sorry I keep forgetting you're a road course guy, and not an autoXer







In any case, glad your season has gone well, and do keep chiming in on the suspension threads (Peter has some more interesting stuff coming up, so stay tuned!).
Cheers again, everyone!
- Ceilidh


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

And yet more info, this time from a Subie WRX forum, concerning use of these pads (Ultimate, Deluxe +, HPS, HP+) on the track. Of particular note are the comments at the end about HPS and HP+ temperature characteristics....
Here's the original link:
http://www.wrxfanatics.com/ind...st=15
And here's the interesting quote:

_Quote »_
POSTED STATEMENT:
"QUOTE (jrowagon @ May 30 2003, 09:14 AM)
Axxis pads are very good if you autocross or use them for heavy track use. I spoke with Dave Zeckhausen on the phone , he's on this forum or check out ZeckhausenRacing.com, he's a brake expert; he basically said your better off with StopTech's Deluxe Plus pads if your car is a daily driver with occasional track use. Axxis are very good , though. Check out the site, it is very informative."
REPLY FROM ZECKENHAUSEN:
The Axxis Deluxe Plus should never be taken to the track. They are the pads to use if your number one priority is dust reduction. Cold bite is slightly less than stock but can be improved quite a bit by proper bedding. See: http://www.zeckhausen.com/bedding_in_brakes.htm. If you've run these pads without bedding them, then you haven't really run these pads. It's night and day. These are very popular among owners of German cars (BMW, Mercedes, VW, Audi) whose stock pads emit crazy amount of dust.
The Axxis Ultimate has much better cold bite than stock. It's maximum operating temperature is higher than stock and it's coefficient of friction is higher across the entire temperature range. It's my favorite all around street pad and I use it on my own cars, whenever I can. They don't make a fitment for the 4-wheel Brembo brake kit on my 2001 BMW 540i 6-Speed, but I do run them in my 2005 Chrysler 300C which has a 4-wheel StopTech big brake kit.
The Axxis Ultimate should only be used at the track by novices or low horsepower cars running street tires. When you start to exceed 1200 degrees, the Kevlar matrix breaks down and the pads lose some structural integrity. They also are very poorly behaved with regard to pad deposition on the rotors. With R-compound tires, lots of horsepower, and Advanced or Instructor run groups, you WILL run into trouble with these pads.
The Hawk HP Plus pads should never be run on the track. Period. Last July, I attended a friction seminar taught by Rob Nelson, former President of Hawk's Friction Division. He warned us that the temperature vs friction profile of the Hawk HPS and HP Plus was unusual in that it fell off a cliff once you exceeded maximum operating temperature. That manifests itself in the following way: One lap your brakes are fine. The next lap your brakes are gone. The pads go into severe fade without warning. These (HP Plus) are excellent autocross pads and have just about the best cold bite of any street pad I've ever tried. But they are not to be used on the track. They also tend to be very squeaky at light pedal pressure, so many people are unable to live with them on a day-to-day basis. Even bedding them repeatedly is not very effective at killing the noise.


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## groftja (Jul 19, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Nice thread Ceilidh! When my time comes for new pads, I'll check back to this thread. My stock 20thAE brakes have impressed me from day one, but I've never really hammered on them either. They do dust a lot though. BTW, I just recieved my H2Sport spindles and will be getting Bilstein HD dampers too. Hey, Phatvw, I think you'll really like the Braille battery you are getting. It's one of those mods, that is not earth shattering in effect, but benefits so many aspects (handling, braking, acceleration, and even less tendency to bottom out front suspension on bumps) and has no downsides. Later!


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (groftja)*

Hello groftja!
Nice to hear from you -- I'll look for your H2Sport report on the suspension board!








I'm close to wrapping up this particular thread; for today, I checked Zeckenhausen Racing's website, and they have graphs of Axxis/PBR Ceramics (Ultimates) vs. Metal Master vs. Deluxe Plus. The graphs are towards the bottom of the following link:
http://www.zeckhausen.com/axxis_pads.htm
(It's strange: on the main page, you can see a red bar for Deluxe (and a purple one for Deluxe Plus), but when you zoom in, the Deluxe (red) is eliminated. In any case, it looks like Deluxe Plus is the way to go (compared with Deluxe), as it has much less fade & high-speed friction variation....)
Now, on the above link, check out the graphs for Dust, Noise, Pad Life, and Rotor Life: the graphs show just how carefully we have to make sure we always compare apples to apples. Among the higher performance street pads (which sounds like Hawk HPS, Axxis Ultimates, and perhaps some of the Porterfields & Carbotechs??), the Ultimates have a reputation for being low-dust, quiet, long-lived pads that are gentle on rotors -- but when you compare these pads across several different categories, even Axxis/PBR (which generated these graphs) says that their Ultimates are moderate dusting, moderately quiet, and moderately long-lived. (Conversely, you can also see how much more initial bite (Cold Performance, Friction Level, and Green Friction) the Ultimates have over the others -- no wonder people are so impressed with them the moment they're installed...)
Have a good weekend, everybody!
- Ceilidh



_Modified by Ceilidh at 12:14 PM 9-16-2005_


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## groftja (Jul 19, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Those graphs were helpful. I saw what you mean about how the red line disappeared when you clicked on the graphs though. So what pads have you decided on? I like what I hear about the Axxis Ultimates the most. I would like to know how they compare to my OEM Pagid pads. I don't know if my Pagids are the same model as the ones mentioned in your first post...I'll try to find out. Mine are quite dusty but quite impressive for my needs and never squeak. Have a good weekend!


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## phatvw (Aug 29, 2001)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (groftja)*

Hey Ceilidh, can't IM you so I thought I'd point you to an interesting discussion that is only somewhat brake related:
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2192289

Now back to random ramblings on brakes.
I really liked the StopTech article on brake bias. I wish they had discussed some of the more modern cars that do not have a proportioning valve like the MkIV VW. For these cars it is much harder to tune your brakes for brake bias.

From reading the article I understood that a particular brake bias value is only 100% effective for a particular deceleration rate. For a different deceleration rate (e.g. in the rain), you need a different bias because of the difference in weight transfer. 
Is it possible to build a variable valve with an accelerometer so that you always get the optimal bias? Now forget about computer control for a moment- this would be all mechanical. All this would likely be cost-prohibitive, but is it possible?
Also, in this context, can ABS be considered a dynamic bias proportioning device?


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (phatvw)*

Hi Phat!
Interesting article & discussion! For me, the warm fuzzies came from remembering my Dad's old mint-green VW Dasher 2-door hatchback with manual steering: at low speeds (parking) it was a better workout than going to the gym. I also managed to run out of gas with it in Rhode Island once, but coasted to the next Interstate gas station by opening the doors & hatch and letting the wind blow it along. It was a sad day when someone totaled it in a snowstorm....
Anyway, so the goal is to build an acceleration-sensing proportioning valve, to maintain the optimal brake bias at all accelerations -- and to do it without modern electronics.







Hmmmm. If you don't mind a rather Rube Goldberg approach, one way might be to tie a proportioning valve to the differential deflection of the front & rear suspensions, so that the amount of brake dive (which is proportional to deceleration rate) controls the brake bias. Another way would be to couple the valving to a heavily-damped pendulum suspended from a transverse pivot, with the forward swing of the pendulum under hard acceleration working to open the front and close the rear valving. There are probably other means too -- but on the whole an electronics approach would probably be easier!
(As for ABS -- I guess it sort of works (kind of) as a biasing device when it's actually engaged, but the article talks about bias at all deceleration levels, most of which are before ABS engagement....)
Heading out for the weekend (camping trip in Hurricane Ophelia's rain -- yay for good planning!) -- I'll try to wrap up this thread next week. Cheers everyone!
- Ceilidh


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## dzeckhausen (Sep 16, 2005)

_Quote, originally posted by *Ceilidh* »_(It's strange: on the main page, you can see a red bar for Deluxe (and a purple one for Deluxe Plus), but when you zoom in, the Deluxe (red) is eliminated. In any case, it looks like Deluxe Plus is the way to go (compared with Deluxe), as it has much less fade & high-speed friction variation....)
Someone sent me a link to this thread, so I thought I would chime in a provide a few clarifying details.
The Axxis Deluxe pads were eliminated from the performance charts because there is no longer an Axxis Deluxe pad. The Axxis Deluxe Plus is their only low-dust organic offering. 
The manufacturer is Bendix-Mintex of Australia (not to be confused with Mintex or Bendix!) and they feed several distributions channels with different brand names. In the United States, they sell under the PBR, REPCO, and Axxis brand names. To make things really confusing, the PBR Deluxe is the exact same friction as the Axxis Deluxe Plus. But that only happened a few years ago when the Axxis D+ compound was introduced. Prior to that, the PBR Deluxe was an asbestos pad with lower performance, corresponding to the missing red bar in my detailed graphs. If you buy a set of PBR Deluxe pads today, you may or may not end up with the higher performing compound of the Deluxe Plus, depending on how long those pads have been sitting in inventory.


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Wrapping Things Up*

Hi Everyone!
I'm wrapping up my contribution to this thread today -- it's been fun!








The original intent was to collect first-hand, knowledgeable comparisons of different street brake pads and to put them all down in one place where people can see them; in particular, I wanted to get away from the "I'm using brand X pads with brand Y rotors and my buddy is using brand Z pads with OEM discs, and my car is cleaner and better performing than his!!" sort of reports -- those reports can (sometimes) be useful, but it's hard to tell how much of the differences are due to the pads, as opposed to other variables like the rotors, driving style, tires, car model, etc.
Far more valuable (for pad comparisons) are careful reports from people who have swapped pads on their own cars, leaving everything else the same -- i.e., reports that truly provide an apples-to-apples comparison. On the performance pad side of things, we have such reports: racers, autoxers, and track enthusiasts like Phatvw and others have been really helpful in telling everyone what happens when they swap out different pads and pad combos for their various weekend events, and hence we have a reasonable sense for what HP+ vs. DS2500 vs. etc. can do for performance (and dust, etc.). But historically it's been tougher getting real comparison info for the gentle-braking







non-racers amongst us, who simply want a nice, non-dusting pad that will work well for normal driving: for us gentler souls, the modest expense and hassle of repeated pad swaps is often just not worth it (e.g., it's one thing to swap pads in the hopes of better times at next weekend's track day -- that's fun!; but somehow it's just less glamour to swap in the hopes of less dust over the next 5 months...). So that's why I put together this thread: other people in non-VWs have compared some of the street pads available to us, and they've posted their impressions online.
Anyway, I can't find any more credible posts, so I'll wrap things up today with the following last few comments/ links/ actions:
.
FINAL SECTIONS:
1) ZECKHAUSEN RACING
First and foremost, I've written to David Zeckhausen of Zeckhausen Racing, and have invited him to contribute to this forum (not just on the low-dust street topics that interest me, but on everything that catches his eye in the broad topic of brake performance). He's come in as of this weekend (his signature is dzeckhausen), and you can find some of his replies in the threads on ABS flushing, rotors, etc.
Please make use of Mr. Zeckhausen's presence here!! I don't know how long he'll stay with us before he has to devote his attentions elsewhere, so if you have real questions (especially those that require real insight and experience), please ask them of him now!
In particular: it's not often that we can get the advice of a specialist performance & racing brake shop that has no ulterior motive (it looks like ZR is free to pick & choose whatever products they think are best suited for an application, and they have a history of dropping products -- even brand-name, profitable lines -- that they think don't offer a significant advantage). It's very nice of David Z. to spend some time with us, so please let's use his time wisely!
2) MATCHING PADS TO INTENDED USES
This next section will be old news to all the performance guys on the forum, but it bears repeating for the rest of us: there are real, real drawbacks in using a brake pad intended for a harsher performance regime than it will actually see (or in plain English, non-racers shouldn't use racing pads!). A succinct account (from a BMW board, on which David Z. posted a reply) reads:

_Quote »_
QUESTION:
Second, what is a good street and very light track (like I might go twice a year, but I autox more frequently) pad? I am willing to compromise some performance for quieter and less dust, as long as the performance is still on par or better than the OEM.
REPLY:
There is no such thing. The operating environment on the track is so dramatically different than that on the street that any one pad designed for either application will not work well in the other.
I must get asked this question at least once per day. I wish there was a pad I could recommend that would make you happy. But any pad with a maximum operating temperature that can handle track conditions will be completely abrasive under street conditions and will quickly unbed itself. After a few hours on the street, your brakes will sound like they came off an old school bus. And the dust will be excessive and they will eat up your rotors. Conversly, any pad that is low dust and low noise on the street will far exceed its max operating temperature on the track and will either be consumed rapidly, will crack and crumble, will fall off of its friction plateau, and/or will "poop" all over your rotors, causing brake judder problems.
I've heard the folks at Porterfield occasionally tout the R4S as a "light duty track pad", but I know first-hand that this compound will fade on lap 3 and ruin your track weekend. Some folks take the Hawk HP Plus pads to the track. But I've been told by none other than the former president of the Hawk friction division to never allow a customer to track with the HP Plus, due to the rapid decline in friction level as the maximum operating temperature is exceeded. One lap you can have brakes and the next lap ... nothing.
You owe it to yourself to see what your brakes are really capable of by swapping out to a track pad the day of (or before) your track day and then swapping back to street pads the day after. I've written up guidelines to help you avoid brake judder issues when doing this: http://www.zeckhausen.com/avoi...r.htm
__________________
Dave Zeckhausen



The critical thing (for us "normal drivers") is the reference to a high performance/track pad "unbedding" itself if not regularly driven very, very hard. As discussed in one of the original articles cited in the first post:
http://www.stoptech.com/tech_i...shtml
a modern pad works by depositing a thin transfer layer on the disc; that is, when the pad is brought up to operating temperature, some of the pad material coats itself onto the disc surface, so that when the brake is working, you have pad material rubbing against pad material, instead of pad material against bare metal. It's this transfer layer that allows modern pads to be high performance yet (relatively!) quiet, gentle-on-rotors, and at least ok on dust, and it appears that the entire braking performance envelope is predicated on the transfer layer being present.
The problem with using an overly aggressive pad for non-aggressive driving is that (if I understand the arguments correctly) when the pad is running too cool, it scrapes off the transfer layer, and you wind up running pad material against bare metal. In this situation, you get noise, rapid rotor erosion, and braking performance that is far inferior to what the manufacturer intended.
(Note: this bedding/unbedding might be one reason why some of the performance pads get such variable reports from different users...)
Bottom line: brakes have to be matched to the intended usage, and if a person has a driving style that is not hard on brakes, he/she should NOT use a very aggressive, track-based pad. (Again, old news to many of you, but many newbies are advised to "Get a better pad!! -- It's just good insurance to have it there, in case you ever need it!"...)








3) THERE IS NO MAGIC BULLET
One thing that's become very clear in assembling the various posts is just how well defined the performance/streetability envelope appears to be. There are lousy pads out there, certainly, and it's probably possible to buy a pad that's simultaneously noisy, dusty, fade-prone, and not very good at stopping a car.....but when we get up to the reputable quality manufacturers like Hawk, Axxis, Porterfield, Carbotech, etc., it really seems to come down to What Are We Willing to Give Up in Return For Desired Qualities. There appears to be no magic here and it's not even a matter of if you gain on X, you automatically lose out on Y: it's possible to gain both X and Y, but then lose out on Z, and the various manufacturers have finely tweaked the various tradeoffs in different ways (e.g., some of the pads are slightly dustier, but with better initial bite; some sacrifice the initial bite for better fade resistance; others make everything pretty good, but lose out on noise, etc...).
So the good news is that there's probably an ideal compromise pad for each of us, regardless of our needs. But the bad news is that it's really, really hard to discover what the minute differences are between different models of different brands, as the permutations are so varied...
4) AXXIS DELUXE PLUS
And finally, yours truly has ordered and installed Deluxe Plus pads on the rear of his GTI (the fronts will have to wait for a bit, for a variety of reasons). I went with them because I'm gentle on my brakes, and am just tired of cleaning my wheels all the time (I park on a narrow street in Boston, and cleaning means schlepping a bucket up to the top of a hill and then crouching at the roadside while kamikaze taxis and tow trucks skim by....), and because my finances preclude trying the much more expensive Hawk Ceramics. It'll be a few weeks (or even months) before I'll be at the point for a report, but once I'm sure about things, I'll tell you all how it works out. Until then, cheers, everyone, and all the best!
- Ceilidh



_Modified by Ceilidh at 11:58 AM 9-19-2005_


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## dmkozak (Aug 22, 2001)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (Ceilidh)*

One thing I have heard, but don't know firsthand, which I haven't seen discussed in this thread is that PBR/Axxis Ceramic produces a light colored dust. So, while it may dust more than the Deluxe or the HPS Ceramic, the dust it produces is light colored and not the black dust which discolors your wheels. So, while there may be more dust, the dust does not discolor your wheels. I don't know how true this is, but it doesn't hurt to add it to this thread.
Also, fwiw, VW changed the pad material sometime in the 2002 model year to a much less dusting material. I never know if the "stock" pad people refer to is the early Mk IV pad or the late Mk IV pad.


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## Banditt007 (Oct 23, 2002)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dmkozak)*

i can attest to the high level of 'green friction' that these PBR ultimate ceramics provided....literally resting your foot on the brake pedal would provide a very firm braking of the car, it was unreal, and then....it went away. i'm pretty sure the green friction thing happened after i bedded them in and went away in a week or two.
i also noticed that on 15" steel wheels and snow tires i would get fade and quickly w/ the ultimates i'm talking one hard stop from 80mph by the time you got to 20mph you needed more force on the pedal to brake the same, DEFINITE noticeable fade...even before completing your one hard stop!!!
now what i found strange was when i went to max performance summer tires on 17" 5 spoke wheels (montes) even after a solid 5 minute flogging of driving extreemly hard, there was no noticeable fade, even when you could see alittle smoke comming off of the front brakes







weird huh, especially when in colder weather and 1/100th of the braking i did on the 17's would equate to very noticeable fade. now i'm not a brake guru but i dont think the rotors saw 900+ degree temps after one stop like that but maybe they did








only thing i could chalk it up to was the lack of cooling the 15" steelies had for the brakes...since they were literally wrapped around the brake caliper/rotor (11.3" brake setup)

also has anyone else expereinced the said 'almost on/off switch'
of the hawk HPS's? i was thinking of those pads next, already have tried them on a honda accord and a lexus rx300 they are decent and seem to start gripping after a nice higher speed stop. but have never tried to get them to fade.
all pads i've mentioned having experience w/ were bedded in properly.


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## dzeckhausen (Sep 16, 2005)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dmkozak)*


_Quote, originally posted by *dmkozak* »_One thing I have heard, but don't know firsthand, which I haven't seen discussed in this thread is that PBR/Axxis Ceramic produces a light colored dust. So, while it may dust more than the Deluxe or the HPS Ceramic, the dust it produces is light colored and not the black dust which discolors your wheels. So, while there may be more dust, the dust does not discolor your wheels. I don't know how true this is, but it doesn't hurt to add it to this thread.

I assume you are talking about the Axxis Ultimate pads? If so, then the answer is a qualified yes. The dust produced by the Ultimate pads is somewhat less black than the dust produced by some factory pads, particularly those used by BMW. But your front wheels will still get more dusty with these pads than any of the "low dust" pads like Axxis D+, Hawk HPS, and Hawk Performance Ceramic. Axxis Ultimate is my favorite street pad, but it's not for you if dust reduction is one of your top priorities.
When you say "HPS Ceramic" you're confusing two low-dust pads made by Hawk. The Hawk HPS is a ferro-carbon compound and does not have any ceramic in it. The new (as of last year) Hawk Performance Ceramic is Hawk's latest low-dust offering and is positioned slightly higher than HPS in price, but slightly lower in performance. They're close enough to each other, however, that I wouldn't be surprised to the Performance Ceramic eventually replace the HPS.


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## dzeckhausen (Sep 16, 2005)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (Banditt007)*


_Quote, originally posted by *Banditt007* »_i can attest to the high level of 'green friction' that these PBR ultimate ceramics provided....literally resting your foot on the brake pedal would provide a very firm braking of the car, it was unreal, and then....it went away. i'm pretty sure the green friction thing happened after i bedded them in and went away in a week or two.

The term "green friction" would be used to define the braking characteristics of a pad before it was completely bedded to the rotors. I've never heard anyone else describe the Ultimate as having an unusually high Cf for the first week after bedding. I would want to see more data in a controlled test before I jumped to any conclusions based on your observations.

_Quote »_i also noticed that on 15" steel wheels and snow tires i would get fade and quickly w/ the ultimates i'm talking one hard stop from 80mph by the time you got to 20mph you needed more force on the pedal to brake the same, DEFINITE noticeable fade...even before completing your one hard stop!!!

If you would like a ballpark idea of how hot stock rotors become during an 80 mph or even 100 mph stop, you should go to my brake testing article ( http://www.zeckhausen.com/Testing_Brakes.htm ) and scroll to the summary data table all the way at the bottom. Use the leftmost column, since that's the 350Z Performance model (same brakes as Base and Touring) that was not equipped with factory Brembos. You won't see temperatures that would have faded the Axxis Ultimate pads.
A single stop from 80 mph is not going to induce fade, or even reach the downward sloping portion of the Cf vs temperature curve of the Axxis Ultimate. What happened here is that your snow tires had a very low mu between them and the road surface. As you slowed to around 20 mph and the brakes heated up and increased their Cf, your wheel speed sensors detected an increase in tire slip and cycled the ABS isolation and purge valves in order to hold a lower, constant pressure on the brakes. You felt a slight reduction in deceleration and pressed harder on the brakes, yet didn't feel a corresponding increase in braking. That's because, at this point, any increase in system pressure upstream of the isolation valves does not result in increased pressure at the calipers. The number of ABS cycles may have been low enough that the accumulator pump was not activated immediately and you didn't feel the characteristic pulsation in your brake pedal that indicates ABS activation. (Most people think the pulsation is the pressure cycling to the calipers, but it's really the pump moving excess brake fluid from the accumulator circuit back to the master cylinder reservoir.)
I'm willing to bet lots of money that if you installed the same make and model performance summer tire on your 15" wheels, you would not experience this "fade" effect. This was the result of the low friction of your winter tires. Trust me on this. I've bedded the brakes on hundreds of cars with summer tires, snow tires, and even (ugh!) all season tires. And I've done it in the sun, the rain, and the snow. In all of these varying conditions, the exact same brakes will feel very different. When I upgraded the tires on my wife's new Chrysler 300C (yes, it has a hemi!) from the "Grand Touring" tires to an "Ultra High Performance" tire, the difference in braking was amazing. Had I not known the tires had been changed, I would have assumed that the pads were fading with the touring tires and not fading with the performance tires.


_Modified by dzeckhausen at 7:41 AM 9-22-2005_


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## dmkozak (Aug 22, 2001)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dzeckhausen)*


_Quote, originally posted by *dzeckhausen* »_

When you say "HPS Ceramic" you're confusing two low-dust pads made by Hawk. The Hawk HPS is a ferro-carbon compound and does not have any ceramic in it. The new (as of last year) Hawk Performance Ceramic is Hawk's latest low-dust offering and is positioned slightly higher than HPS in price, but slightly lower in performance. They're close enough to each other, however, that I wouldn't be surprised to the Performance Ceramic eventually replace the HPS.

Ya, I screwed up. Brain fade, not to be confused with brake fade. I meant Hawk Ceramic, but somehow typed HPS Ceramic. Thanks for the correction before I further confused somebody.

_Quote »_ I assume you are talking about the Axxis Ultimate pads? If so, then the answer is a qualified yes. The dust produced by the Ultimate pads is somewhat less black than the dust produced by some factory pads, particularly those used by BMW. But your front wheels will still get more dusty with these pads than any of the "low dust" pads like Axxis D+, Hawk HPS, and Hawk Performance Ceramic. Axxis Ultimate is my favorite street pad, but it's not for you if dust reduction is one of your top priorities. 

If it doesn't dust any more than stock, and I'll only be driving this car on the street as a daily driver, then I'd be crazy not to follow your lead and go with them. Many thanks for your help and participation.


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dmkozak)*

Hello dmkozak,
I had the Ultimates on my car for about half a year, and can tell you a little bit about the dust:

_Quote, originally posted by *dmkozak* »_One thing I have heard, but don't know firsthand, which I haven't seen discussed in this thread is that PBR/Axxis Ceramic produces a light colored dust. So, while it may dust more than the Deluxe or the HPS Ceramic, the dust it produces is light colored and not the black dust which discolors your wheels.....
Also, fwiw, VW changed the pad material sometime in the 2002 model year to a much less dusting material. I never know if the "stock" pad people refer to is the early Mk IV pad or the late Mk IV pad.

My car (a 2000 GTI) must have had a split combo on the OEM pads: with aftermarket pads (Mintex Redbox for a while, then Axxis Ultimates), the dust has been pretty even front & back (if anything, the rear's been dustier), whereas with my original OEM pads, the rears were much, much cleaner than the fronts. Hence let's assume for now that my car somehow wound up with the "new" OEM pads at the rear, and the original ones at the front...
In any case, the Ultimates do put out a somewhat lighter coloured dust, but it's by no means unoticeable. If anything, the dust made the wheels yellowish/brownish and hence rather dirty looking; the Mintex Redbox dust is actually a little less objectionable, as it's closer to a neutral grey (at least until it gets wet).
But on a more macro level, the Axxis dust was greater on the back wheels than I had with my OEM pads, but less on the front. So if my car had the "new" OEM pads on the rear and the "old" OEM on the front, then the Axxis dust is somewhere in between. To put that in a different perspective, the Axxis dust, in terms of unsightliness, was very close to what I've had with the Mintex Redbox: the colour and the amount differs between these two pads, but the net effect was fairly similar.
Cleaning, though, is a different story: In contrast to the OEM pads, which stained the wheels if I didn't remove the dust right away, and which were a pain to scrub off, the Axxis dust was very easy to wipe off with a single pass of a soapy sponge/brush -- almost as easy as the Redbox. So they're much easier to live with than the OEM was.
Performance wise, there was no comparison -- the Ultimates had far, far more grip, and I never had any fade problems.
Hope the above data helps, and have fun with your car!


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## Banditt007 (Oct 23, 2002)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dzeckhausen)*

while i dont doubt your expereinces i will still call it fade in the fact that even after the 80mph stop, reaccelerating to say 15mph and then braking lightly took alot more effort from the pedal to get the same amount of 'ease into a stop' braking than normal..... and after driving around for 10 minutes the brakes would slowly come back to feeling like they usually do. I completely understand what you are saying about the whole abs system. but i dont think that was the case, very strange indeed being that i remember reading how the ultimates had a higher tolerance to fade, yet the stock pads would never fade out nearly as quickly....
....as for the green fade thing it was awhile ago so it could have been before i bedded in the pads, but i feel like it wasnt the case b/c usually i bed them in right away and dont drive around for a week or two, before bedding... anyway like i said the braking was like hair trigger for the first week atleast...was super impressed w/ the brakes and then like i said it just went away and never came back.
I'm not making any judgements about the ultimate ceramics based on my set of pads simply b/c everything i expereinced with them was very strange and did not react like any of the other pads i have tried. IMO it was either a bum set of pads, or the things really have alot less performance than are advertised.
About the abs feeling that you are talking about i seem to notice that especially at very high speed hard braking....where you do not hear the ABS pump kick in, and maybe every second or so one 'tick' in the brake pedal, and it stays high and firm, and you try to hit the brakes harder and harder and the pedal seemingly dosent move, and the braking although reasonably hard, should be much harder. I would then have to remove my foot from the pedal and try again (which is rather scary) and this would usually correct the situation and i would have the feeling of normal braking.
But that was the thing w/ my MKIV GTI the high speed braking seemed to be totally garbage no matter what tires/suspension/brake pads. No fade, either pad or fluid, just that you could hit the brakes as hard as you wanted at 130 braking to say 110mph and the braking would be no where near as good as from 80-60mph. I'm thinking this could be to the suspension having trouble keeping the tire in good contact of the road b/c of the speeds involved the suspension cannot react as quickly?


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## dmkozak (Aug 22, 2001)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (Ceilidh)*


_Quote, originally posted by *Ceilidh* »_ Cleaning, though, is a different story: In contrast to the OEM pads, which stained the wheels if I didn't remove the dust right away, and which were a pain to scrub off, the Axxis dust was very easy to wipe off with a single pass of a soapy sponge/brush -- almost as easy as the Redbox. So they're much easier to live with than the OEM was.
Performance wise, there was no comparison -- the Ultimates had far, far more grip, and I never had any fade problems.
Hope the above data helps, and have fun with your car!

The reasons for picking Axxis Ultimates for a street driven daily driver seem to keep growing. I really haven't heard of any good reason not to go with Axxis Ultimates for a street driven daily driver. Thanks again.


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: Wrapping Things Up (dmkozak)*

Hello dmkozak,

_Quote, originally posted by *dmkozak* »_....I really haven't heard of any good reason not to go with Axxis Ultimates for a street driven daily driver....

This is not really a "good reason" to avoid the Ultimates, and I might well be the only person in the world who feels this way (Dave Zeckhausen for one probably thinks I'm a little strange in this respect!), but I thought I should tell you that I actually took the Ultimates off my car this past Spring, and reinstalled the Mintex Redbox -- the problem was that I found the Ultimates too grippy!
I'm used to cars with much higher brake pedal pressures than the Golf/Jetta has, and even with the OEM brakes, I used to complain that the brakes were too sensitive. With the much maligned Redbox, the brakes come in much more gradually with initial pedal pressure (which is one reason why so many people hate them), and for me that's closer to the feeling that I like. With the Ultimates, the feel was great with moderate or heavy braking, but with light feathering, the strong initial bite was more abrupt than I prefer. So I went back to Redbox (and next I'll try the Axxis Deluxe Plus).
Anyway, apparently nobody else in the world actually dislikes a brake with strong initial bite and a high coefficient of friction, so the above likely won't apply to you or anyone else(!).







But I thought I should just mention it for completeness.
Cheers! - C


_Modified by Ceilidh at 1:39 PM 9-23-2005_


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Hello again!
No new info, but I found a link that has the Axxis pad data clearly visible on a single page (no mousing & clicking needed), and I'm putting it here for reference sake:
http://www.tech-session.com/kb...&c=48
It'd be really nice if someday someone could add non-Axxis pads (e.g., the various street Hawks, Mintex, Porterfields, Carbotech, etc.) to these graphs, but realistically I guess that'll never happen. Still, at least with Axxis, a fellow can tell what he's getting himself into.








Cheers everyone!
- C


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*

Hello once more!
On a different thread, a fellow named "machschnelGTI" made an interesting post, and since this particular thread has sort of turned into a Low-Dust Pads / Axxis information list, I thought I'd just cut & paste his comment here, for future reference (and I'll throw in a couple of Dave Zeckhausen's comments as well, from earlier in the same thread):
Here's the first one from D.Zeckhausen, in answer to a fellow looking for a low-dust rear ceramic pad:

_Quote, originally posted by *dzeckhausen* »_
Why do you specifically want a "ceramic" brake pad? What is it about the ingredient "ceramic" that the marketing folks have convinced you is desirable? You should really be asking about low dust, low noise, rotor friendly, pads. By specifying ceramic, you eliminate an entire range of pads that will meet your performance requirements. You really should specify the performance you want, not the ingredients.


When a suggestion came up that the fellow should install rear Axxis/PBR Ultimates to complement his OEM-like fronts, D. Zeckhausen responded with:

_Quote, originally posted by *dzeckhausen* »_
I would not suggest Axxis Ultimate as a low-dust pad, nor would I install it on the rear without a matching set up front. The Axxis Ultimate has an unusually high coefficient of friction (Cf) for a street pad and it is not a good idea to install rear pads with higher Cf than front pads. This changes the bias of your brakes and rear bias is unstable. Front bias is not as much of a problem. It's analogous to understeer vs oversteer.
If you were to pick an Axxis pad for the rear brakes, the more appropriate solution would be the Deluxe Plus. It's going to meet your low dust requirements as well as maintain compatibility with your OEM front pads.


At this point, the fellow who started the thread explained that he had been told that ceramic pads are "low-dust", and he just wants something comparable to the low-dusting ceramic pads on the front of his car; machschnelGTI then came in with the following post:

_Quote, originally posted by *machschnelGTI* »_
I am in the brake industry...so here's some food for thought. Brake pads cannot be classified simply in 3 different catagories: Ceramic, Semimetallic, and Organic. While those are 3 different types of brake pads, there are hundreds of formulas of each. The difference between 2 different Ceramic Pads can be greater than the difference between a ceramic and a semi met pad. The formula for everyones brake pads is like the secret to Coca Cola, nobody except the factory knows exactly what goes into them...they just know what base ingredient is used (Ceramic Fibers, Metal, or Organic Fibers) Who cares what they're made out of....they just have to fit the criteria you are looking for in a brake pad. Axxis Ultimates are very dusty pads, probably comparable to an OEM VW pad (Ate or Pagid) and it is a very high friction, fade resistant street/track pad. I have used these on my racecar with excellent results. Axxis Ultimates are also not very rotor friendly. They will not destroy the rotors like Hawk Blue, but the rotors will be shot when the pads are shot. The Axxis Deluxe Plus would be an excellent pad to fit your needs. They are very low dust, rotor friendly, and stop great. They can't handle extreme temperatures like the Ultimates can, but on the street, these temperatures will NEVER be reached, especially on the rear. 


Ok, so now we have two brake professionals saying very similar things! Kind of reassuring, isn't it?







Anyway, just putting the posts on this thread for future reference's sake. Have a great weekend, everybody!
- Ceilidh
P.S. -- have 800 miles on my rear Deluxe Plus pads now; haven't had to clean the rear wheels yet, though the fronts (still with Mintex Redbox) have been cleaned once and are becoming filthy again. The official jury's still out until I can install the Deluxe Plus on the front as well (hopefully ~Thanksgiving), but early signs are that yes, the Axxiss DP appears to be a very low-dusting pad. I'll post a full report after the fronts go on....


_Modified by Ceilidh at 11:47 PM 10-7-2005_


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## dmkozak (Aug 22, 2001)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (Ceilidh)*


_Quote, originally posted by *Ceilidh* »_ but early signs are that yes, the Axxiss DP appears to be a very low-dusting pad. I'll post a full report after the fronts go on....
_Modified by Ceilidh at 11:47 PM 10-7-2005_

And, how's the stopping power and noise? From what I can gather, they're a stock replacement with low dust, low noise, and slightly better braking and feel. How close am I?


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: PBR Ultimate / Deluxe Plus ; Hawk HPS / Ceramic ; Pagid Blue info (dmkozak)*

Hello David,
I'm reluctant to say anything definitive until I get the front pads in, as I still have Mintex Red Box up there and I've been fooled in the past by mismatched brake sets. But here are some preliminary impressions:
1) The Axxis Deluxe Plus behaves very differently when it's cold versus when it's been warmed up.
2) It's always low noise (once bedded in, that is -- before bedding, it could squeal on light brake application)...
3) ...and it's extremely low-dust. There's a huge cleanliness difference between my Redbox-shod front wheels and the DP-shod wheels in the back: Currently in the Boston rains (2 full weeks continuously forecast!), the fronts are brown, but the rears are shiny silver. Besides putting out a lot less dust than Mintex (which supposedly are a low-dust pad), the DP emits dust that is hard to see against the silver wheels; the result is perceived cleanliness that should double or maybe triple the time I can go between washings.
But as for performance and feel....
4) When cold, the Axxis DP is nothing special -- very similar (as far as I can tell) to Mintex Redbox. When you come to the first stop sign of the day, or plunge down an exit ramp after cruising for an hour on the Interstate, the brakes do work -- it's not an "Oh No!" moment -- but the retardation is fairly mild, and it can surprise you with how hard you have to press on the pedal. I'd venture that when stone cold, the DP has less initial bite than OEM, but more linearity and better feel (albeit at higher pedal pressures).
5) It doesn't take much to warm the pads up, however: a couple of city stop signs will do it, as will a single highway exit ramp.
6) When the pads are warmed up, they seem to have considerably better braking power than the OEM pads ever did. At least on my '00 GTI, the original stock pads grabbed well on first application, but they weren't that easy to modulate, nor did their power under duress seem to match their initial promise. But the DP, once they have some heat in them, grab quite well -- not as well as the Axxis Ultimates, but better than Redbox (the ABS triggers first in the rear on our cars, and I've just swapped rear Redbox for rear DP: I can trigger the ABS more easily now than I could before). Moreover, during the bedding process (ten 60mph-5mph hard stops in quick succession), the ABS (on the rear DP) tended to trigger even after the fronts (still Mintex-shod) had begun to fade -- so it appears that the DP fade resistance is better than Redbox.)
7) The best feature thus far, however, is the linearity! During the bedding deceleration runs, it was easy to hold the car just short of ABS onset, with the rear wheels chirping continuously without the ABS coming in. That was not the case with the stock or Mintex pads, and in general the feel of the DP (once warm) is really very nice.

_Quote, originally posted by *dmkozak* »_And, how's the stopping power and noise? From what I can gather, they're a stock replacement with low dust, low noise, and slightly better braking and feel. How close am I?

To sum up:
When cold, they're a stock replacement with low dust, low noise, slightly worse braking, but slightly better feel.
When warmed up, they're a stock replacement with low dust, low noise, noticeably better braking, and much, much better feel.

I'll let you know more after Thanksgiving, when the front DP goes in. Cheers!
- C



_Modified by Ceilidh at 1:09 AM 10-14-2005_


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## jb4153 (Mar 14, 2005)

I've been looking to replace my front and rear pads with DP's but can't seem to find a good place that sells them. Where did you purchase yours from?


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## Ceilidh (Jan 7, 2004)

*Re: (jb4153)*

Hello JB,
I purchased mine from Dave Zeckhausen ( http://www.zeckhausen.com/ ). 
On their website, the VW link isn't working quite right, so I telephoned them ( (973)761-5054 ) and talked directly to Dave Z. (or more accurately, I left a message and he called right back).
The price was pretty good (~$35 for the rear set; haven't purchased the fronts yet); if they don't have something in stock, they can get it for you pretty quickly -- just give them a call!
- C


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## jb4153 (Mar 14, 2005)

*Re: (Ceilidh)*

Great! thanks for the info. I think I'm gonna go ahead and get the front and rear set.


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