Road Disc Brakes- Rotor Choice

[robertbb]

I've got shimano grx group and a pair of afs 03 160mm rotors incoming intended to use with it. (lo3 pads), I'll try to measure/photograph it.

This would be really appreciated if you can! Will you use stock pads?

Yup the standard LO3 pads (will be a short while, have to build the wheels to fit the rotors to also. hubs incoming too, soon I hope).

Awesome! Subscribed!!

[NLC86]

I tried three rotors

Sram centerline xr
Galfer road wave
Campy af03

Sram is good all around. Consistent. Not thin feeling. Not much rubbing either. Just not pretty to my eyes.

Galfer is very light but does feel a bit thin. The bite is strong but fade a little in steep downhill. I am too chicken to use it since these were 140mm front and back.

Campy af03 offers me the best experience. Feel solid throughout the lever pull. Initial bite is not strong but the modulation to deeper bite is very pleasant. The braking power curve feels great. Not too immediate and not too light. Never bent, never fade. A little heavy compared to Galfer but I will take these feeling over a few grams.

Thanks, which pads are you using with Campy discs?

Right now the Galfer pads. But experience stays the same even with sram pads.

Many thanks!! Did you get strange noises using SRAM pads?

[ichobi]

Not sure what you mean by strange noise but not really, no. There's ocassional rubbing but after readjusting the caliper, all works fine. The AF03 rotor is really solid. I can't see it bents easily, at least compared to other rotors.

[Tifosiphil]

Has anyone got any suggestions on best/preferred 140mm 6 bolt rotors?

Probably looking at either the Hope option or Swissstop Catalyst currently but open to suggestions. To be used with Swissstop pads in DA 9120

[Aesch]

Double

[Aesch]

Awesome! Subscribed!!

So I got everything set up. Rotors look nice, however both came out of the package slightly bent and they're not completely round or centered on the spline (?). This made setup a lot more difficult, especially to get the front pad rub free took me over an hour.
I did the bedding in and it shows the pad contacts the rotor well. It is very hard to photograph the exact position in the grx caliper, visually the top of the rotor and top of the brake pad are flush or the rotor is just outside the furthest margin of the rotor (that's how I found out they're not completely round/centered).

First ride soon I hope! I had less issues setting up my xt discs or xtr discs. Reason to change was noise when wet on the gravelbike. Hope that is solved now

[bilbobogeins]

I just switched to Galfer road wave CL and Galfer pads. Coming from shimano R8020 stopping performance seems like a big improvement. No complaints and much quieter in the wet also.

[robertbb]

Awesome! Subscribed!!

So I got everything set up. Rotors look nice, however both came out of the package slightly bent and they're not completely round or centered on the spline (?). This made setup a lot more difficult, especially to get the front pad rub free took me over an hour.
I did the bedding in and it shows the pad contacts the rotor well. It is very hard to photograph the exact position in the grx caliper, visually the top of the rotor and top of the brake pad are flush or the rotor is just outside the furthest margin of the rotor (that's how I found out they're not completely round/centered).

First ride soon I hope! I had less issues setting up my xt discs or xtr discs. Reason to change was noise when wet on the gravelbike. Hope that is solved now

This is great feedback! Thank you!!

A 160mm rotor is a 160mm rotor, notwithstanding miniscule thickness differences there should be no reason for pads to not make proper contact across the brake surface. So whoever reported that elsewhere has something very strange going on...

It's normal for rotors to be slightly bent (hence the existance of rotor truing tools).

It's not normal for them to not be round (aside from those weird shaped rotors of course). I wonder if this actually has more to do with the caliper mounts requiring facing on your frame/fork? Is the problem apparent both front and rear? Misaligned or improperly faced caliper mounts are in my view the major reason for poor performance of discs (squealing, rubbing). Way moreso than the disc system itself.

[Aesch]

It could be that it's not perfect faced however setup was super easy with the previous wheelset and xt rotors as well as my road wheelset for this gravelbike (which uses ztto hubs and ~15 usd ztto rotors and they were, and still are, super straight out of the box as well as super quiet with excellent stopping in all circumstances so far..)

I tried truing the rotors but that was harder than I thought, will have to dive into the how-to for this a bit more.

[StiffWeenies]

Shimano has new L05A pads that replace the old L03A

[Ensi]

Shimano has new L05A pads that replace the old L03A

does anybody know what has changed?

[1llum4]

Pretty much every Shimano resin pads with a 03 got changed to a 05 version this year. The resin compound has changed hence the product name change.

[Mr.Gib]

Rotors look nice, however both came out of the package slightly bent

It's quite a business were in. My Shimano rotors also came bent.

It's normal for rotors to be slightly bent (hence the existance of rotor truing tools).

I can't really go along with this. Can you think of another consumer good made of metal that comes bent, and must be bent again by the user to get it to work?

This industry is feeding us a steady diet of shit that we keep eating. Hopefully there are innovations to come that will solve this problem.

[fizzaz]

I'm all for shitting on the bike industry, but cmon. The pad clearances are so small that even a slight bend from shipping could give you the ole ting-ting.

[openwheelracing]

Pretty much every Shimano resin pads with a 03 got changed to a 05 version this year. The resin compound has changed hence the product name change.

any detail on the compound differences? Performance differences? Longevity...etc?