Best brake pad for a 1968 non power s/b

[Bob W.]

What would be the best brake pad to put on a 350/350 hp non power brake car ? I am looking for a little better stopping power.


Thanks Bob

[Gene M.]

Re: Best brake pad for a 1968 non power s/b

A metallic or ceramic impregnated pad will increase friction over the originals but understand it will wear faster on the rotor.

[Dick W.]

Re: Best brake pad for a 1968 non power s/b

The aggressive materials, for the most part, will require more pedal pressure. With that said, the edge code on the pads tell you a whole lot about the pad. EE will give you a little more braking when driving normal, but when they get hot they tend to fade more quickly that FF, GG, etc.

Unfortunately you cannot have a brake friction material that requires less pedal pressure and will give you good braking when they get hot. Metallics pretty much suck when cold, as me how I know

[Leif A.]

Re: Best brake pad for a 1968 non power s/b

These will work just fine.

[Duke W.]

Re: Best brake pad for a 1968 non power s/b

The aggressive materials, for the most part, will require more pedal pressure. With that said, the edge code on the pads tell you a whole lot about the pad. EE will give you a little more braking when driving normal, but when they get hot they tend to fade more quickly that FF, GG, etc.

Unfortunately you cannot have a brake friction material that requires less pedal pressure and will give you good braking when they get hot. Metallics pretty much suck when cold, as me how I know

It's the other way around. The letters indicate the friction coefficient in increments of 0.05 cold and hot, and the higher the letter the greater the Cf. Most currentC2/3 replacement pads are FF, which is about what the OE pads were, but I don't think this rating system was used back in the day. If you can find a GG or GF they will reduce pedal effort. The GF rating would indicate some fade at very high temperature. Off hand I don't recall the temperature for the high rating, but I think it's something on the order of 300C. An internet search will reveal more particularly looking at the Friction Materials Standards Institute (FMSI) Web site.

All brake pads/shoes have a number based on their geometry. The Corvette pads are D8 because they were an early design. The D-number is up in the several hundreds now.

Also understand that brake pads can become "glazed" due to lack of use or light use. Sometimes you can "tune them up" by hard use, which will break the glaze and increase the Cf back to when they were new.

The C2/3 Corvette disk brake system is overdesigned, especially the rear, so non-metallic pads are best for normal road use because it would be tough to overheat them and non-metallic materials wear better, are easier on the rotors, and dust less than metallics.

Most non-metallic materials, nowadays are referred to as "ceramic". They work well, have long life, and low dust. I recall my '88 Mercedes had excellent brakes when new, but they were noisy, wore fast, were tough on the rotors, and created horrible black dust. On advice from experienced Merc owners I installed a set of Repco Deluxe (ceramic) pads (FF) all around at 15K miles. Pedal effort increased a bit, but they barely dusted and never faded, and I estimated their life as something on the order of 90K miles based on periodic measurements of remaining friction material as the miles accumulated.

A few years ago I decided to replace them while I can still work on cars. It's the last set it will ever need. The replacement pads are called Repco Deluxe Plus. The front pads are GF and the rears FF. Pedal effort went down, and I'll never drive the car hard enough at this point to fade them.

BTW, Repco is the Australian outfit that designed and built the C4 brake system, but they may go under another name now due to a buyout. I don't know if they offer the Deluxe Plus for C2/3 Corvettes, but it's worth checking out.

Duke