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Ford Explorer Community - Maintenance - Modifications - Performance Upgrades - Problem Solving - Off-Road - Street
Explorer Forum Covers the Explorer ST, Explorer Sport, Explorer Sport Trac, Lincoln Aviator, Mercury Mountaineer, Mazda Navajo, Ford Ranger, Mazda Pickups, and the Ford Aerostar
I am replacing my front rotors more often than the tires. I am running 31" BFGS on 8" rims. It seems they are constantly overheating the brakes. Of course my driving style my also have an effect on this. Short of putting disks in the back, which is a real option for the future. What can I do. I was considering slotted rotors in the front. Does anyone have any braking upgrade suggestions.
You are lucky 93-94 explorers have the option of getting slotted rotors - for some reason they don't make them for 91-92. Anyhow, I would purchase them over the cross drilled rotors b/c I had the cross drilled from powerstop and one of the rotors cracked on me. If you are willing to forgo the extra expense, I would either purchase them and then get them cryogenically frozen or I would purchase them already treated (there's a link on this site). Cryo freezing helps the metal bond better and the rotors will not only last longer, be much less prone to cracking, but they will run cooler as well.
I would reccomend upgrading the rear brakes to discs. Currie Enterprise offers a kit that is completely bolt on short of having one small tab welded to your axle tube for the line connection. You should also add a proportioning valve to your rear line to adjust the bias of pressure. These are available from Summit Racing. I can tell you the uprgrade is worth every penny.
Also any competent machinist can slot rotors for you but, slotting only keeps a smooth surface on your brake pads and will do nothing for the cooling aspect. It also helps to dissipate the gases that build up during heavy braking between the pads and rotor, thus improving your braking.
If you want some quality cross drilled rotors that will not be prone to cracking call KVR (they are based in Canada). Cracking in cross drilled rotors can usually be attributed to drilling them and not chamfering the holes properly(i.e. putting tapered edge on each hole). I have had their slotted rotors for awhile now with excellent luck and I drive quite aggressively.
ART (applied rotor technolgies) makes slotted/cryo treated brake rotors. I know they have them for 91-92 and others. We have a set on our 92 explorer. There is a big difference in breaking performance. We used to replace the rotors/pads (rotors were warped) about every 15k miles. We have 30k+miles on the new rotors/pads and last time I looked at them (a few weeks ago) the pads had more than 1/2 of them left.
For $300ish you get 2 rotors and 2 sets of pads. It is also a very easy install.
I was skepticle(sp?) about the cryo treating of the rotors actually helping but after researching it for a while, everyone who has cryo treating done to parts (brake rotors included) have reported less wear and more strength. I figured it was worth a shot and was worth every penny.
Here is a link to an install article (with pictures) of an ART brake rotors upgrade that I sent to Rick to be added to the review section.