Hello,
My son just bought his first 350z, not bad for an 18 year old. We are wanting to upgrade the brakes on his ride, but we are on a tight budget as we have other projects going on as well. Can someone Please give me some recommendations on the type of brakes to get. My son wants to get the slotted and drilled type. I want to keep the price reasonable, but also want the quality brakes to stop this machine. Any help will be Greatly Appreciated.

brembo blank rotors, some quality pads (check out stillen's site), stainless hoses, and flush the lines and replace the fluid. drilled/slotted rotors will just eat pads.

First off, welcome to NICO!

I've moved your thready to the Z33/Z34 Discussion forum, as it's better suited here.

Now, as far as brake upgrades, it's all a matter of how much you wanna spend. It's nothing really to drop $2k on a decent brake setup. For example: http://www.z1motorsports.com/350_g35/pr ... ts_id=4626

As far as slotted and cross drilled, if you're not upgrading calipers, not racing, and not upgrading diameter, there's really no reason to buy new rotors. You'll see more benefit by upgrading to SS lines.

Bottom line though, is how much you're willing to spend. Give us a budget and we'll figure out the best bang for your buck.

Welcome.

If you want to upgrade brakes for very little money, you could always upgrade the pads to a slightly more aggressive performance street ones. There are many good brands out there, like Hawk. I know kids will say they want a full race pad. I'd suggest avoiding that. Race Pads do tend to work better, but only when they're hot. And the kicker is they can actually perform worse than stock when cold. And as the father of a teen driver, I want excellent cold pad performance even more than hot performance, especially when you consider brake pads in ordinary street use do not tend to get that hot.


i have an 03 non-brembo 350Z. I did many track days on the stock OEM brakes before upgrading the entire system (a $3K+ investment). The stock brakes performed extremely well, good grip, no fade. The only complaint I had with them was how short the pads lasted under prolonged hard track use. If I did not use the car so much on track, I would have left the brakes alone.

Regardless of how you upgrade the brakes, don't forget to replace that brake fluid. Very important. It would not surprise me If the brake fluid in that car 10 years old. And when you change it, upgrade to DOT-4, which is more moisture resistant.

Good luck.

I'll repeat what I tell everyone that wants shorter stopping distances - buy better tires.

Drilled rotors are more prone to cracking than are blank or even slotted rotors since the majority of drilled are drilled after they've been formed. Top end drilled rotors are cast with the holes so less strength is lost. If your son still wants the look of drilled I suggest going with a dimpled rotor.

My recommendation is to go with a blank faced or slotted rotor. I ran a combination of Powerslot rotors and Hawk HPS pads on my 240SX and that was more than enough for the street and some mountain road driving.

Braided steel lines will firm up the pedal feel and if you're really looking for some reassurance, though it's overkill for most, you could load up the brake reservoir with DOT 4 fluid, ATE Type 200 is a relatively inexpensive choice. Be advised that the higher DOT rated fluids are more hygroscopic and will need to be changed more frequently. No DOT 5 FLUID! It's silicone based and will kill the brake system. DOT 5.1 is fine, though for a street car it's completely unnecessary and from a cost-benefit viewpoint it's pretty silly.

Welcome to NICO!