Time for first brake job. To upgrade or not???

**Poseidon215** · 09-24-2010

Ok so I have had this car for almost 2 months now and its about time I replace the brakes all the way around because from sitting the rotors rusted to **** and the rough surface is eating up the pads so they wont make it through the winter.

So the question is do I just go to autozone or maybe rockauto and grab pads and rotors all the way around and spend like 250 for lifetime gold ceramic pads and 2yr rotors? OR do I upgrade to something possibly cross drilled and slotted with some pads that have more bite?

Any thoughts or ideas?

Also since I dont have a signature yet and nobody reads minds I have an 05 Grand Prix Base

**Bio248** · 09-24-2010

12" upgrade is cheap and effective if you want to put down ~$120 for everything at the most.

**alkygto** · 09-24-2010

^Agreed, Big difference in stopping power.

And no drilled rotors, always plain or slotted.

**Brennan7** · 09-24-2010

yes ^^

**cerick08GP** · 09-24-2010

Well, IMHO since your 05 already has big/better OEM brakes than the 97-03 models going bigger isn't really necessary. You could still upgrade, obviously. However your stock sized rotors with like Hawk HPS or EBC red stuff pads are very effective at stopping a GP.

**Poseidon215** · 09-24-2010

Originally Posted by Bio248

12" upgrade is cheap and effective if you want to put down ~$120 for everything at the most.

Dont the 04-08 come with 12" rotors standard?

So if I already have 12" rotors then I just need to find a better pair than the OEM ones that are still on from the factory. (BTW car only has 21k thats why its still all original) So what should I look for for both front and rear?

Moving on to pads again open to opinions lol

And finally the biggest question is calipers. Is it worth upgrading? I have read some threads about getting dual piston calipers and everything. Should I look into this? I looked on rockauto and found GXP dual piston calipers but idk if they will fit or not and I remember someone saying the impalas had an option for dual piston calipers.

Let me know what u think I still have some time before I pull the trigger

**matt5112** · 09-24-2010

Originally Posted by cerick08GP

Well, IMHO since your 05 already has big/better OEM brakes than the 97-03 models going bigger isn't really necessary. You could still upgrade, obviously. However your stock sized rotors with like Hawk HPS or EBC red stuff pads are very effective at stopping a GP.

Just do what this guy said.

Pick one of those two pads and get quality rotors and you'll like what you get.

**blueguy** · 09-24-2010

Drilled and slotted FTW. I don't care what you peeplz say I loved mine even on stock sized brakes with D/S'd rotors/new EBC red stuff pads...awesome compared to stock rotors and junk-o pads. Just sayin'...