I bought some r1 concepts carbon drilled and slotted rotors and ceramic pads on ebay for 140 including tax (crazy good price).

I opened the box and they werent at all like the pictures.
The front rotors didnt have paint machined off / double grinded for pad bedding texture.
The rears looked like the pictures but upon closer inspection, I saw dimples next to the drilled holes.

fronts that dont look finished



rears with defects

I emailed them and they never got back to me and a month later ebay closed the dispute in my favor.
I was more than willing to work with them but they just never bothered!

Now after all this I have a set of brake pads, front rotors that might be usable if turned, and rear rotors with defects.

Questions after some venting/explanation:

Are these rear rotors safe to drive on?
Will the "imperfect" surface cause accelerated pad wear?
Something else I havent thought of?

 

What's imperfect about the surface? That's normal and quite ok. Those cross hatch marks will dissipate once the rotors are in service.

 

There are three little dimples right next to the holes that were drilled (bottom picture of rear rotors, in the foreground). They look like the metal might have chipped off during machining. There are about 10 total of these spread across two rotors.

 

Myself, I wouldn't use them. Brakes are a safety item. A shop could check them for trueness and turn them if they're not. How do you know what the alloy is? You got your money back, go to Carid or someplace like that and buy a decent set. I'm not interested in rear ending someone. Are you?
The Jag is a performance machine I think you should treat it like one.
Ford had a problem with counterfeit parts years ago. A real ford part would stop the car in about 160 feet from 60 miles an hour. The counterfeit parts took something like 230 feet.

I always had good luck with Bendix rotors but I haven't had to do rotors in a long time.

 

Thanks for your input. I think Im going to do just that.

r1 is a pretty reputable company that uses Centric blanks (if memory serves) and usually has good products.

Im thinking that the guys in the shop had a night out at the bar Thursday and came in a little hungover Friday morning when they got to work on mine.

I was thinking of getting some life out of them in the interest of keeping them out of the dump.

 

I agree completely, I hate throwing anything away that might have some use to it. Safety items are different, lives are at stake then.

 

Personally I think that the rotors would be ok, do the dimples look like metal has flaked off or more like a centre punch mark?
Both surfaces are acceptable, I replaced rear rotors on my’99 XJR recently one had a ground surface and the other was turned, straight off the bat there’s is no difference in the braking action and the car pulled up straight when on a track day last Sunday. The front rotors I had I cross drilled them myself on a pedestal drill, al good so far. (I’m a retired toolmaker so fairly confidant in my process )

 

The dimples do look very "clean" almost like someone started, then realized they were on the wrong spot. Do center punches take off material in this fashion?

 

Quality isnt there, move on. Just the fact that you have to ask questions about the brake rotors says it all. Decent units are cleanly machined and look perfect out of the box.

 

Amature job, as Steve says. Move on.

Here is one homemade (in the workshop at work) by an engineer I worked with. Couldn't fault the workmanship or the performance of it. When I said I had to buy a new rotor for the bike he offered to make me one for a Mars bar.
The ones you have are worth a few $$$ at the scrap yard. I wouldn't even consider using them.

 

Thanks for the tips everyone. I had searched high and low on other forums about this sort of defect as well and couldnt come up with anything. Now I know even more about what to look out for. Online schooling at its best! Cheers!