Alternatives to carbon ceramics

[8Tech]

Has anyone researched any alternatives to these seemingly problem ridden issues associated with carbon ceramic brakes? Noise, vibration, wear and costs all seem to make me look for an alternative as an upgrade. It's almost standard practice with the Porsche boys who are enthusiasts rather than posers to remove them asap and fit steel discs with associated pads and refit the CCM's at sale time.

I am going to look into this.

[AdamV12V]

In the 11 years Ive owned Astons with CC's only had a little issue with squeeling on the early cars and that was fixed under warranty with new compound pads.

I dont believe there are any real issues with wear - they will last the lifetime of the car if driven normally on roads and not tracked. Vibration was specific to early DBS cars, rather than attributable to the CC's generally.

Porsche boys who swap them are generally the track-heads, as the cost of replacing them isnt worth the small performance gain. I dont think that situation really applies to Astons as few people track their cars, compared to say the 991 GT car owners, where such comments are more commonplace.

For normal spirited road driving the improved lightness from the unsprung mass weight reduction and resulting handling / steering feedback is a significant step up over steels and going back to steels would seem like a rather pointless downgrade unless of course your CC's were worn out due to some track time, and you didn't fancy the cost?

Edited by AdamV12V on Monday 31st May 11:50

[FredoMusicman]

New pads are certainly cheaper then new steel discs and new pads (for steel) I guess ..?

[DAVIDOXE]

Im on my fifth Aston with CCMs and have not had any issues. My first V12V had done 17k miles on the original pads with plenty of life left and discs perfect. As stated thats with no track use but plenty of spirited road use.

[RiknRoll]

My advice having spent a lot of time (and money) researching alternatives is to just stick wit the stock CCM's if that's what you have. If you wear them out you can try re-brake in Germany to refurbish, though i cant tell you how good or not they are, it seems to me the best option instead of replacement.

DO NOT try racingbrake steel replacements. Expensive, poor quality product with utterly disgusting service and a total lack of support when their product goes wrong, which it will. Plus they make the handling noticeably worse as they ruin the damping.

[drac]

I'd be looking at these,

https://surfacetransforms.com

Much better tech than OEM and selected partner for Valkyrie.

Unfortunately not cheap.

[Astontony]

I have had my Vanquish 2 gen for 8 months now, frequently do hard driving through twisty roads and have not had any squealing or vibration in fact if you didnt know they were CCB you would think they were steel albeit better at stopping and no fade.

I have heard on this site of a company that can resurface CCB's for a fraction of the cost of new ones and they say they are a better product. There is a site mentioned in one of the previous posts that links to their web site.

The only small issue I have had was a small stone stuck in the caliper which I quickly removed by stopping and reversing. No scratches that I could see in the disc and I understand this is not uncommon. I also witnessed this on an F Type with CCB's same problem, sounded terrible ,he reversed and it dislodged.

[LooneyTunes]

I would be very concerned about how things would play out with respect to insurance if you’ve swapped out carbon ceramics with steels, especially if running a model that was only supplied with carbons. Irrespective of any real world difference, i suspect the view could be that you’ve replaced a high performance part with something inferior/unsuitable.