Brake Dust; is there really any solution
 

2013 Grand Sport. 7k miles with Hawk Ceramic one-piece brake pads.
Dusty, really dusty. The top two photos are after driving 500 miles home from a long trip (4,000 mi). I had to clean the wheels every day as the dust was terrible. On our final 500 mile run home this what the wheels looked like after we got home and I had cleaned them the night before.

You can really see how bad it was when you compare to the last photo which shows the wheels all cleaned up.

Is there any solution?

http://i1021.photobucket.com/albums/...ps766f36c2.jpg

http://i1021.photobucket.com/albums/...psff184cf9.jpg

All cleaned up...
http://i1021.photobucket.com/albums/...psaa294fa7.jpg

Is it brake dust or just road dirt? You probably didn't use the brakes much on the 500 mile trip unless you were on 2 lane roads with frequent little towns. The don't generate dust unless you use the brakes.

And how'd you get the inside of the wheels so shiny?? Looks really good.

Yes, Get the standard ceramic brake pads from GM. I had the same problem till i switched. Yes you lose some braking performance. If you track allot, don't do it. If not, you will never notice the difference.

Plus the rotors will wear some due to harder pads, but nothing that significant.

No doubt it is brake dust. Rears were not nearly as bad as I would have expected.

I stripped the paint off of the wheel barrels...

Do they make them for the Grand Sport/ZO6 brakes?

I had the GM pads on my base 2010 coupe and really liked them.

Do your Hawk pads squeal? Mine squealed like someone scratching a chalk board, The Hawk pads were terrible, switched to GM pads. Problem solved and so was my dust problem too.

Yes they squeal. Kind of embarrassing.

From this post on Corvette Forum about the issue, http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c6-c...rake-pads.html

I was thinking they made GM factory ceramic pads for the grand sport like the base models too. They work really good, no squeal, I think it's just something Hawk pads do. Mine were terrible.

I switched my Z06 early on to Posi Quiet Semi-Metallic pads, same brakes as GS. Ran them for 4 years and they stopped good with no problems, no squealing or noise and 90% less dust.

Armor All wheel protector May have to reapply every few washes ,but it works

:iagree:

Ceramic pads. I just installed them on my Z, and I am a happy camper! Little to no dust. :cheers:

Which pads did you install?

I'm definitely not going with Hawk by the sound of it. My OEM GS pads are squealing like crazy with only 6k and I did bed them in and stop hard once in a while

Put Hawk ceramic padlets on my 2010 GS. Knocked the dust down by 80% and no squeal. No difference in braking performance for a street car. I also painted the wheel barrels black.

I have the one-piece Carbotech 1521 pads, and they also squeal a little and generate a lot more dust than I expected. And keep in mind I used a special anti-squealing rubber backing (spray), as well as lubing all pins. The Carbotech padlets squealed like a scalded pig, so after fighting for weeks with Carbotech, finally got them swapped for their 1-piece pads. On the plus side, compared to the stock GS padlets, at least the dust is not reddish in color, nor greasy, which drove me nuts because it's a PITA to clean. The new 1521 padlets and 1-piece pads dusted like crazy initially, but they still dust a lot more than many people reported on this forum after initial 'break-in'.

Bottom line is you cannot do any better than the GM ceramic pads, but we don't have that option on the GS. Of the GS ceramic options, I strongly believe the Carbotechs are not worth twice the Hawks, so that's what I'd get if I had to do it all over again. And avoid the padlets folks, since they have much more of a chance to squeal more, due to no anti-squealing backing plates... and being 20 leading edges, vs 8 for 1-piece pads. Simple math. Good luck.

So get Hawk, one piece, ceramics, for the GS? Obviously no issue
mechanically to switch to one piece pads, I guess...

My car has the Z51 package, and I'm pretty sure that GM ceramic pads are part of that option. I get no squeal at all, but I do get a little "groaning" when backing out of the garage. I can live with that ... may just be the automatic adjusters ... adjusting.

I do not have a intrusive brake dust problem. I tend to use the brakes as little as possible.

Now the rear end dust is an other subject!

Ya but that photo of my wheels is from 95% highway and the Hawk one-piece pads.
The Caebotech pads were worse! I've got a set of them with 1k miles sitting in my basement.