Alright, so a few months ago my brakes and throwout bearing coincidentally started to go at the same time. My front rotors are mildly warped, and the mechanic says it's too much to think about machining them. As for the throwout bearing, my brother's friend and I are just going to replace the clutch since I'm at 75k miles and it'll have to be replaced eventually, so I might as well do it when labor will be free.

I'm looking to spend about $550-$600 for both the clutch kit and rotor pair. Are the ones listed below good? I'm just a casual driver who occasionally likes to go fast, and I figure it'd be cool to have some nice aftermarket parts if I can find them at basically the same price the dealership is.

Rotors: http://thmotorsports.com/rotora/roto...s/i-90714.aspx
Clutch (one of these?): http://thmotorsports.com/act/act_clu...d/g-50002.aspx

Thanks for any advice

 

How about one of these,,,,

clutch--flywheel

brake-rotors

 

I'm no expert, but if all you're doing is daily driving, and the occasional agressive driving on that long strech of highway that you know that there are no cops on, you won't have a need to buy anything extra other than OEM replacements from Brembo/Exedy. If you plan on doing track days, or something along those lines, you might want to do some more research on what's best for your application. Start searching for other threads on the topic and you'll find some vaulable information.

If you're gonna get new rotors, don't forget to go ahead and get some pads to!

Don't waste money for a fancy name.

 

They're too expensive. I understand you want to promote your own shop though! :p

As for the Brembo replacement rotors, they are more expensive then the other ones I'm looking for are.

 

Rotora Slotted Brake Rotor Front & Rear- $404.80
Brembo OEM Rotors Front & Rear - $390.00

So yeah, the Brembo OEM Rotors are $14.80 cheaper, lol. It pays to do your research.

BHR does have very competitive pricing, I'll agree with that.

 

Just wanted to back up my previous statment with links and other info starting with the one in your post:

$101.20 R.45070.1S - Position: Front-Left; Excl Sport Suspension
$101.20 R.45070.2S - Position: Front-Right; Excl Sport Suspension
$101.20 R.45072.1S - Position: Rear-Left; Excl Sport Suspension
$101.20 R.45072.2S - Position: Rear-Right; Excl Sport Suspension

Total: $404.80

 

Oh, I'm sorry if I was unclear, which I guess I was. I only need front brake rotors. Also, the Mazda mechanics said my pads were just fine and there's no point replacing them (I replaced them last summer).

I like the price of the Bremo replacements on BHR, but I dunno. I like the look of the slotted rotora's.

 

Well, that's cool. Slotted rotors are great if you're in it for looks. Check out the brake FAQ on that for more info. On a side note, I just found out that the Brembo Rotors were discontinued, so no luck with those, lol!

 

The stock brakes are pretty darned beefy. Your rotors didn't warp due to inadequate brake hardware. Search the forum or Google for "bedding-in" of brakes and you should run across an article that describes how "warping" happens. Warping in quotation marks because it's actually not warping at all.

 

Centric rotors @ TireRack.com are $58 apiece for front rotors, $41 for rears. I just recently got them and they're pretty decent.

 

Assuming I didn't know about this when I bought my pads last year, should I attempt to "clean" my rotors (I guess it has to be machined to do this?) and try to bed it in? Or should I just buy new rotors and keep my old pads, or new rotors and new pads (and do the bed-in process)?

 

I would get the thickness of the rotors checked (either get your own micrometer or have someone else measure for you). Stock spec for front rotors is 24mm new, and the replacement threshold is 22mm.

If you're nowhere near the replacement threshold, and there are no deep scores in the rotors, I would look into either turning them or using a more aggressive pad to scrub off old deposits.

An ideal situation is new pads and new rotors.

 

Mmk, will do. Can you tell me more about the Centric rotors? I mean, did you do a lot of research and looking up to see if they are good quality/etc, and how long have you had them? It's just that they're really cheap compared to everything else, so I'm a little skeptical.

 

I just put them on over the weekend. A couple people on the forum have vouched for them (justjim has linked many people to them all over). There's not much I can tell you about them other than they're cheap and seem reliable since I haven't seen nor heard anything bad about them.

This was my first time replacing rotors, so I really don't have much of a basis for comparison.

EDIT: Many that track and autocross approve: https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-wheels-tires-brakes-suspension-55/centric-premium-brake-rotors-181142/ A search for "centric rotors" yields a handful of threads.

 

CENTRIC Part # 12645070SL {Centric High Performance - Slotted Rotor}
Automatic trans.; Normal Susp; Front Left
* Non-stock item--shipping delayed up to 2 business days
$81.79 $0.00 $81.79

CENTRIC Part # 12645070SR {Centric High Performance - Slotted Rotor}
Automatic trans.; Normal Susp; Front Right
* Non-stock item--shipping delayed up to 2 business days

Found on: http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/raframecatalog.php

So you think those will be good? I like the look of slotted, so I think I'll spend the extra $30 per for it. Dunno why in the sub description is says "Automatic trans;" aren't brake rotors indifferent to the transmission? Also, it says "Normal Suspension"... Does that really matter what it says? I don't know if my (stock) RX-8's suspension is considered normal suspension.

 

Some (most?) automatic transmission RX-8s (especially the ones with 16" wheels) do not come with the "sport suspension" which includes 12.7" front rotors. The "non-sport" ATs come with smaller front brakes (thus smaller front rotors).

I am fairly certain that all MT RX-8s come with the larger brake rotors.

Rear rotors are the same between sport and non-sport.

I am rather indifferent to slotted rotors myself.

 

Hmm, ok. I will continue my search then.

I took a few pictures of my brake rotors for you guys to look at. http://www.flickr.com/photos/46154249@N03/
I read somewhere that the brembo oem replacements show 2 marks for good condition and 1 mark for "prepare to replace" kinda thing. I don't know if the stock rotors are like that too. How do you think mine look? The first is of the passenger side rotor, the other two the driver side.

 

Lol, well I found some Centric slotted ones for the MT on the same site, but they're $102 per with $18 shipping. The original site I posted with the Rotora's is $100 per with free shipping. I guess I'll have to decide soon whether the slotted is that important to me. Thank you for your help with that maskedferret.

Does anyone have some input clutch wise? Is my current selection good? I'm searching around the forum to find some other suggestions. I'll see...

 

Bump