CROSS-DRILLED ROTOR OVERVIEW

[wheel whores]

CROSS-DRILLED ROTOR OVERVIEW

You buy cross-drilled or slotted rotors for performance right? Well they say, "Cross Drilled Discs will last up to twice as long as O.E.M. rotors (depending on your braking style)." That little parenthetical statement should give you a clue! Most people that are going to buy cross-drilled rotors are going to buy them because they drive harder, demand more out of their braking system, hence a more aggressive braking style. I warped my Brembro cross-drilled rotors in about 2 years.... and I was in school...my car sat most of the time.

I agree with these two statements that were made on a vendor's site, within a certain extent "40% Better Cooling, 20% better stopping; Improved Wet Braking"

The following statement is very misleading, "Lower Brake Temperature Reduces Rotor Warpage" Yes your normal operating brake temperature may be lower, and yes your rotors may cool a little faster, however lower operating temperature and cooling speed aren't major players in warpage. Actually, cooling something faster will warp it faster then a gradual cool down.

Again...another very misleading statement, "Less Brake Fade and Longer Life" Yes they reduce brake fade, by keeping operating temperatures down. However brake fade is more attributed to the compound material on the brake pad itself. Same rotor with different pad material (ex. organic, and semi-metallic or carbon metallic) will exhibit totally different temperature range, braking performance, and life expectancy. The reason OEM brakes fade like hell is the pad compound, it's organic (most are). I could nuke a set of organic pads in no time flat...cause their level of heat tolerance is so much lower than a semi or carbon metallic pad. However they are quieter, and since Joe Public doesn't give a sheit about how their car performs, they just want it to go from point A to B, it don't matter. However for the few that want better performance you need to step up to a better pad.

GAS SLOTTED ROTOR OVERVIEW

Ok before I look at what they said, one thing should be noted. Look at how one sided their two pages are for cross-drilled rotors...hmmmm.

Ok first thing they say "Enhanced Initial Bite" Sure this gives you may get a stronger "BITE" from the slot, BUT that is NOT what it is there to DO!! The slots on the rotors are to vent the build up of gasses produced in the interface between the rotor and the brake pad material! That is really all they're meant to do. Some brake pads have a slot down the middle, this slot also helps release those gasses. Main thing is, if you have gasses between the rotor and the pad, you loose braking performance, you do not have as solid a direct contact between the two.

"Intended For Track Use" I can say the same for cross-drilled, this statement is TOTALLY OPINION and should not be on a page comparing slotted and cross-drilled!

I'll agree with this "Better Cleaning of Pad Friction Material" Yes over time the pad material will get a glazed surface on it. The slots will help wipe this glaze away, or keep it from forming. However...this is trivial.

Again....more misleading information, "Slotted discs offer cleaning of the friction material (brake pads), but do little in terms of additional heat dissipation. Slotted brake discs do not cool better than cross-drilled discs or even standard discs. The face grooves will slice the brake pad material allowing the pad to bite harder into the disc, therefore causing an increase in disc temperatures. This is recommended for competition vehicles to bring pads and disc temperatures up to optimal operating ranges. (Race cars warm-up engines, tires and brakes for the best possible performance)."

The thing they are pushing in the above paragraph is how much better the cooling is with cross-drilled rotors, and that slotted add heat. The main thing I find very misleading is, with ANY rotor-pad combo, you will have heat generation from driving...even if you DO NOT touch the brakes AT ALL. Rotors drag against the pads. You will get heat build up. Your rotors and brakes are designed to work better with a little heat in them. Ever drive you car first thing in the morning on a cold day. The brakes aren't too good when they are cold, so why do you need to excessively cool these rotors that are going to generate heat anyway? (Exception is organic pads...they work decent when cold, but better when a little warmer)

MAJOR POINTS MISSED BY THESE TWO ARTICLES

There are several key points that they failed to mention, rotor warpage and the main cause of it. The main cause of warpage in any material, object, whatever is heating it beyond a certain point where plastic deformation occurs, now there's really no force being put on the rotor that it can't handle, our force is heat, so think of heat being a force and there is a curve that this material will follow on when it is heated and cooled. Think of warpage when the material is pushed past a certain point along this curve.

Also cyclic loading of a material will also cause failure, or warpage in our case. Heating up and cooling of a rotor is our cyclic loading. Again, the more rapidly you do this, the greater your chances are for warpage. So if you go drive like a crazy person and then park your car the rotors will cool faster then if you drove nicely around for a couple miles to slowly bring them down in temperature.

That brings me to my next point; When you drive your car hard, and park it, the part of the rotor which is exposed to air cools at a different rate then the part that is touching the pad material. The pad material will retain heat a lot longer then the air, so you will get a spot on the rotor where the pad sat that will be warped. A friend of mine who works in motor sports, Indycar to be exact, told me that during a practice session they would go through rotors, i.e. warp them faster then they would if they were in a race. The main reason, like I said above, is the cyclic cooling of the rotors from really hot to cold, and the "hot spot" from the brake pad.

The main point or problem with what they say about warpage has to do with something they talk about, heat dissipation. They say that they have increased heat dissipation with cross-drilled rotors. This is partially true. At lower to medium temperatures the holes in the rotor allow more surface area, and as any good mechanical engineer or thermal scientist knows, you can achieve better cooling with more surface area. The holes in the rotor sort of act like the fins in your radiator, they aid in cooling the rotor. However those holes are a double-edged sword. They actually do more damage then they are supposed to help. When you cross drill a rotor, you take material out of it. Well guess what, that material is what helps that rotor maintain a certain level of performance before it warps. The more material you have the better heat distribution you get through the object. Think of it as I said before, a curve that this rotor follows when it is heated and cooled, and there is a certain plateau or ceiling where warpage occurs. When you remove material from the rotor, you decrease this ceiling. So it actually takes less heat to warp the rotor then it did before you started drilling holes in it. So if you look at the cooling by the holes in comparison to the loss of heat dissipation or heat tolerance that the rotor can handle, you have a balance scale. What is more important? Well In my book, I would want that ceiling to be as high as it could be to ward off the effects of warpage. Who cares if you rotor runs slightly cooler for normal use, and may cool slightly faster. The main thing they were saying was that cross-drilled reduces brake fade. This is 1/10 correct, better pads reduce brake fade.

Another thing, heat flows through the rotor as it heats up. With a normal rotor this heat is evenly dispersed and expelled. With the holes in cross-drilled rotors you get an interruption in this heat flow through the rotor. You again get hot spots or points where the material is discontinuous, and with these discontinuous points you get added stresses or higher temperatures at these discontinuities. So if you would look at a thermal image of a normal rotor you would see an evenly spaced out heat flow in the rotor. With cross-drilled you will see cold and hot spots in certain areas of the rotor. Temperature is a cyclic force and over time, with these hot spots occurring around the holes you end up with cracks, where the material has failed.

One last thing, there is actually a formula to calculate how much material can safely be removed from a rotor without compromising it's ability to dissipate the heat generated in it. So with larger rotors you can have more or the same amount of holes and it don't matter, there is plenty of material there. But with smaller rotors there is less material so you either need fewer holes to maintain a safe amount of material to dissipate the heat or you will lower the "ceiling" at which the rotor will warp.

CONCLUSION

Ok to sum everything up. Cross-drilled rotors are good for fast heat dissipation and reduction in braking gasses, however they are prone to warpage because of their less amount of material, and lower peak temperature tolerance. They are good for racing applications where you need very fast cooling from high-speed stops, and where they don't care about the longevity of the rotors. They are not practical if you want to get more life out of your rotor. Slotted rotors main advantage is that they help get rid of the braking gasses between the rotor and pad. They are good for mild to medium racing applications and for the performance minded street driver. The longevity will be greater then that of cross-drilled, yet may be a little less then stock. There are also high performance rotors that offer a combination of both slotting and cross-drilling.

I guess now you may be asking what gives him the authority or background to be saying all this. Well first off I have gone through the hassles of cross-drilled rotors myself, and had the down sides of cross-drilling happen to me. Secondly I have researched and found NON-BIAS articles and information on the two types of rotors, as well as consulted several automotive professionals on the topic. Next I am a mechanical engineering major at Penn State, and have had courses in the areas I have talked about, the stresses, cyclic loading, temperature, discontinuities, and heat transfer. So I'm not just talking out of my ass on these things. Finally, like other performance-minded drivers I too want to get the most out of my car, and have looked into the different possibilities and option

[Big Z]

Another one...

[wheel whores]

sorry if its a re-post but did a search and found nothing

[Saleem786]

now found this. good info.
i personally wud never use cross drilled rotors and i cant seem to convince myself that slotted is an "upgrade". good good info here

[bushwakka]

I copied the below post from another member on another forum....good info...a lit garbled as i presented it here tho....apologies

Those Poor Rotors

QUOTE
Crossdrilling your rotors might look neat, but what is it really doing for you? Well, unless your car is using brake pads from the 40’s and 50’s, not a whole lot. Rotors were first ‘drilled’ because early brake pad materials gave off gasses when heated to racing temperatures – a process known as ‘gassing out’. These gasses then formed a thin layer between the brake pad face and the rotor, acting as a lubricant and effectively lowering the coefficient of friction. The holes were implemented to give the gasses ‘somewhere to go’. It was an effective solution, but today’s friction materials do not exhibit the same gassing out phenomenon as the early pads.

For this reason, the holes have carried over more as a design feature than a performance feature. Contrary to popular belief they don’t lower temperatures (in fact, by removing weight from the rotor, the temperatures can actually increase a little), they create stress risers allowing the rotor to crack sooner, and make a mess of brake pads – sort of like a cheese grater rubbing against them at every stop. (Want more evidence? Look at NASCAR or F1. You would think that if drilling holes in the rotor was the hot ticket, these teams would be doing it.)

The one glaring exception here is in the rare situation where the rotors are so oversized (look at any performance motorcycle or lighter formula car) that the rotors are drilled like Swiss cheese. While the issues of stress risers and brake pad wear are still present, drilling is used to reduce the mass of the parts in spite of these concerns. Remember – nothing comes for free. If these teams switched to non-drilled rotors, they would see lower operating temperatures and longer brake pad life – at the expense of higher weight. It’s all about trade-offs.
Quote:

Quote:
QUOTE
"What are the benefits to Crossdrilling, Slotting, and Zinc-Washing my rotors?

In years past, crossdrilling and/or Slotting the rotor for racing purposes was beneficial by providing a way to expel the gasses created when the bonding agents employed to manufacture the pads...However, with today’s race pad technology, ‘outgassing’ is no longer much of a concern...Slotted surfaces are what Baer recommends for track only use. Slotted only rotors are offered as an option for any of Baer’s offerings."


Quote:
Then from Grassroots Motorsports:
QUOTE
"Crossdrilling your rotors might look neat, but what is it really doing for you? Well, unless your car is using brake pads from the '40s and 50s, not a whole lot. Rotors were first drilled because early brake pad materials gave off gasses when heated to racing temperatures, a process known as "gassing out." ...It was an effective solution, but today's friction materials do not exhibit the some gassing out phenomenon as the early pads. Contrary to popular belief, they don't lower temperatures. (In fact, by removing weight from the rotor, they can actually cause temperatures to increase a little.) These holes create stress risers that allow the rotor to crack sooner, and make a mess of brake pads--sort of like a cheese grater rubbing against them at every stop. Want more evidence? Look at NASCAR or F1. You would think that if drilling holes in the rotor was the hot ticket, these teams would be doing it...Slotting rotors, on the other hand, might be a consideration if your sanctioning body allows for it. Cutting thin slots across the face of the rotor can actually help to clean the face of the brake pads over time, helping to reduce the glazing often found during high-speed use which can lower the coefficient of friction. While there may still be a small concern over creating stress risers in the face of the rotor, if the slots are shallow and cut properly, the trade-off appears to be worth the risk. (Have you looked at a NASCAR rotor lately?)

And then, let's check out what was said on the aforementioned Altima thread [[[ Long thread at altimas.net that was deleted by that server. it is hosted here ]]]:

QUOTE
Here is how it works. The friction between the pad and rotor is what causes you to stop. This friction converts your forward energy into heat (remember Einstein: Energy is neither created nor destroyed, it is converted). Now that heat is a bad thing. Yes it is bad for the rotors but it is a lot worse for the pads. A warped rotor will still stop the car - it will just feel like ****. Overheated pads however WILL NOT stop the car. It is here where the rotors secondary responsibility comes in. Its job now is to DISSIPATE the heat away from the pads and DISPERSE it through itself. Notice that DISSIPATE and DISPERSE are interchangeable? Once the heat is removed from the pad/surface area it is then removed. Notice where the removal falls on the list of duties? That's right - number 3. Here is the list again. Memorize it because I will be using it a lot in this post:

#1 Maintains a coefficient of friction with the pad to slow the forward inertia of the vehicle

#2 DISSIPATE the heat

#3 REMOVE the heat from the brake system

Let's look more in-depth at each step now shall we? No? Too bad assclown we are doing it anyway.

#1 Maintains a coefficient of friction with the pad to slow the forward inertia of the vehicle:
This one is pretty simple and self-explanatory. The rotor's surface is where the pads contact and generate friction to slow the vehicle down. Since it is this friction that causes the conversion of forward acceleration into deceleration (negative acceleration if you want) you ideally want as much as possible right? The more friction you have the better your stopping will be. This is reason #1 why BIGGER brakes are the best way to improve a vehicle's stopping ability. More surface area on the pad and the rotor = more friction = better stopping. Does that make sense Ace? Good. Let's move on.

#2 DISSIPATE The Heat:
Let's assume for a second that the vehicle in question is running with Hawk Blue pads on it. The brand doesn't really matter but that is what I am using as my example. They have an operating range of 400 degrees to 1100 degrees. Once they exceed that 1100 degree mark they fade from overheating. The pad material gets too soft to work effectively - glazing occurs. This means that a layer of crude glass forms on the surface of the pad. As we all know glass is very smooth and very hard. It doesn't have a very high coefficient of friction. This is bad - especially when I am coming down the back straight at VIR at 125MPH. Lucky for us the rotor has a job to do here as well. The rotor, by way of thermal tranfer DISSIPATES the heat throughout itself. This DISSIPATION lessens the amount of heat at the contact area because it is diluted throughout the whole rotor. The bigger the rotor the better here as well. The more metal it has the more metal the heat can be diluted into. Make sense? This isn't rocket science here d00d.

#3 REMOVE the heat from the brake system:
Now comes your favorite part of the process. This is what you thought DISSIPATION was. It is ok. I will allow you to be wrong. This is the step where the rotor takes the heat it DISSIPATED from the pads and gets rid of it for good. How does it do this? By radiating it to the surface - either the faces or inside the veins. It is here where cool air interacts with the hot metal to cool it off and remove the heat. Once again there is a reoccuring theme of "the bigger the better" here. The bigger the rotor, the more surface area it will have which means more contact with the cooling air surrounding it. Got it? Good.

Now let's look at why cross-drilling is a bad idea.

First - as we have already established, cross-drilling was never done to aid in cooling. Its purpose was to remove the worn away pad material so that the surfaces remained clean. As we all know this doesn't have much of a purpose nowadays.

Next - In terms of cooling: Yes - x-drilling does create more areas for air to go through but remember - this is step 3 on the list of tasks. Let's look at how this affects steps 1 and 2. The drilling of the rotor removes material from the unit. This removal means less surface area for generating surface friction as well as less material to accept the DISSIPATED heat that was generated by the friction. Now because of this I want to optimize step one and 2 since those are the immediate needs. If it takes longer for the rotor to get rid of the heat it is ok. You will have a straight at some point where you can rest the brakes and let your cooling ducts do their job. My PRIMARY concern is making sure that my car slows down at the end of the straight. This means that the rotor needs to have as much surface as possible to generate as much friction as possible and it needs to DISSIPATE the resulting heat AWAY from the pads as quick as possible so they continue to work. In both cases x-drilling does nothing to help the cause.

Now let's talk about strength - and how x-drilled rotors lack it. This one is simple. Explain again just how drilling away material/structure from a CAST product DOES NOT weaken it? Since you are obviously a man of great knowledge and experience surely you have seen what can happen to a x-drilled rotor on track right? Yes it can happen to a non-drilled rotor as well but the odds are in your favor when pimpin' bling-bling drilled y0! Since you are also an expert on thermodynamics why not explain to the group what happens to a cast iron molecule when it is overheated. I will give you a little hint - the covalence bonds weaken. These bonds are what hold the molecules together boys and girls. You do the math - it adds up to fractures.

So why don't race teams use them if they are so much better? Consistency? Hmmmm . . . no. I am gonna go with the real reason her chodeboy. It is because of several factors actually. They are as follows but in no particular order:

- Less usable surface area for generating friction
- Less material to DISSIPATE the heat away from the pads
- Less reliable and they are a safety risk because of fatigue and stress resulting from the reduced material

And what are the benefits? Removal of particulate matter and enhanced heat removal. I gotta tell ya - it is a tough choice but I think I am going to stick with the safe, reliable, effective-for-my-stopping needs solution Tex.
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So basically, buy them if you think they look cool, but not if you think this will be an acceptable performance upgrade.

[ST Auto]

good info here