My car has the 11.75 Wilwoods in front, near new, no issues. Rear is old, worn stock rotor, good pads but I want to tear it out for stainless rear lines, brass bushings, new rotors, so I need new pads. Front and rear currently appear to be the same pads. Light brown brake dust and sound like 80 grit sandpaper when braking, especially when cold. Work very well, though. Unable to ID what they are, though. Not colored, so probably none of that red or green stuff. These are the pads the previous owner used for daily driving. I got another set in a box that were used for autocross. Again, no way to ID the brand plus they are pretty worn. I don't really want to change anything up front, the rotor is very nice, the pads close to 75%. Do I just slap some "know to be good for daily use" pads on the rear, or do I swap out all four? Wilwood doesn't make pads for the OWM rears of the Mini, so if I want matching pads on all 4 corners I will have to go aftermarket, e.g. HAWK or EBC. Akebono doesn't make pads for Wilwood. Heard some bad things about both brands, so not sure if it's worth that much cash compared to just some Akebonos in the rear and calling it a day. I am guessing there are a lot of cars out there with Wilwood pads up front and similar but different brand compound in the back. If so, I guess I need to get my Wilwood rotor turned, but I'm not so sure who will touch such a rotor, given it sits on a hat, etc - need to safety wire it all up again, just a lot of work when I really don't need to do anything but flush the fluid. Ideas, opinions? I want to do those brakes next weekend or the weekend after, so I have a few days to go shopping. Oh, and just sanding down the rears probably won't work well, because the rotor is so grooved, I'd probably have to take off 1/3rd of the remaining pads
For my Wilwood setup (13" front & 11.75 Rear) on the street I use Hawk HPS on both the front Wilwood FSL caliper and rear OEM caliper. They have been good for over 50,000 miles. I switch to Wilwood B on the front for the track. In the past I also used Hawk HPS in the front and EBC Green in the rear for the street. Again I just changed the front for the track. I do not see any problem having a different pad in the front than in the rear. I suspect any basic pad will work fine in the rear. The rears do get hot in the rear when pressed hard (track use) so a good rear pad is still important. I have had the rotors turned (to remove brake pad transfer) by a local brake shop with the hats still attached to the rotors so there should not be a need to remove hats to get the rotors turned.
Good to know I can just leave the rotors on the hats for turning. I think that's what I'll be doing so I can get new pads all around at the same time. I also think that given the fronts do the heavy lifting, there's no huge issue if there's a different pad in the back as long as its performance envelope is meant for the expected use (street in my case), although with turned fronts, I think I'll just go for new pads this time, and when those are done, it's new rotors all around anyway. thanks