We’re going to slow down a bit now for some quality advice on choosing quality brake parts. Taking the lead is our own Dan Maffett on MotorWeek’s “Your Drive.”

DAN MAFFETT: Every vehicle owner knows eventually you’re going to have to maintenance your brakes. We’re here with Dieter Lorentz from Bosch and he’s going to tell us why quality parts are important for performance.

DIETER LORENTZ: Thank you, Dan. So, it’s very important to have high quality components, and a brake job is going to provide less brake fade, it’s going to also reduce– better heat dissipation and it’s going to also allow that system to work properly as it was designed by the OEM manufacturer. So, in the example we have here– so we have a newer rotor here. If it’s new out of the box you can see the finish has a nice uniform unidirectional finish. The one right here, you can see, is one that’s been in service for a long period of time…

DAN MAFFETT: A very long time.

DIETER LORENTZ: …and it’s obviously gone way too long before service work was done here.

DAN MAFFETT: Right.

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DIETER LORENTZ: So, these components, the rotor, everything here, would need to be replaced in this service, and behind us on the vehicle here we can see that this is what a normal in-service rotor assembly would be. So, there are some differences on the finish of the rotor. Good quality pads will also come with new hardware. So, many of our complaints for the customer is noise-related…

DAN MAFFETT: Right.

DIETER LORENTZ: …and also receiving or achieving normal pad wear. So, if the pads hang up on the hardware or on these slides, you know, most areas of the country have some rust or—or adverse conditions, so this always affects the sliding of this caliper assembly and the pads from wearing evenly.

DAN MAFFETT: Right. So, then as far as performance goes, what are modifications consumers can do to their vehicles for better performance in their braking?

DIETER LORENTZ: So, on most of the vehicles, a good overall pad would be a ceramic-type pad. We gain a lot of good things from that. We get low dusting because that’s one of our major complaints; on the rim of the tire you get a lot of dust. Noise. Those are primarily our biggest concerns. Now, behind that we also need to have good quality parts to ensure a good stopping distance because, at the end of the day, what’s most important is the vehicle stops properly.

DAN MAFFETT: That’s the goal.

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DIETER LORENTZ: Yeah, it’s very important. It’s also, you know, people’s lives and obviously a lot of cost is involved with vehicles, so it’s imperative that the system operates properly to what it was designed to. We can upgrade to ceramic-type pads that are going to be better performance for the vehicle. Some severe-duty materials are we could have semi-metallic pads as well. They may have a better feel for some people, depending on their driving style…

DAN MAFFET: Right.

DIETER LORENTZ: …but then there’s always a trade-off. There could be more noise and also more dusting on those as well.

DAN MAFFETT: Right.

DAN MAFFETT: There’s definitely a trade-off based on those and that’s why quality performance parts are important for safety on a vehicle.

DIETER LORENTZ: Yes. So, all of these are foundation brakes. All of our safety systems in the last 50 years have been built on this system working properly. So, we need a good foundation brake system to allow anti-lock brakes, stability control systems, and all our adaptive cruise control and emergency braking systems to work properly.

DAN MAFFETT: Okay. Well, thank you for coming out and talking with us. Guys, as always, if there’s any questions or comments, hit us up right here at MotorWeek.