Currently running AP1 pads on my AP2, brakes are pretty decent (motul 600, ss lines, new rotors) installed few months ago. I want more initial bite out of the brakes however... I am okay with more dust but don't want any noise. This will be a 100% street car so no aggressive pads please.

 

Buy some sort of decent semi-metallic pad on Rock Auto.

Centric, Bendix...whatever.

Powerstop trackday pads are like $130 for the set. But...might be noisy...not sure.

 

try Stoptech Sport pads out. they have pretty decent bite and don't squeal at all.

 

Stoptech Sport pads are good for agressive street driving and mild/beginner track. They don't squeal but do dust quite a bit more than OEM pads.

Powerstop Track Day pads are great, I say they perform 90% as good as Carbotech/GLoc XP10/R10 pads at half the price. They don't squeal on the streets as long as you bed them in properly (very important with any performance pad). They do dust quiet a bit, but it washes right out and isn't harmful to your paint.

 

Switching to these from Project MU Club Racers. I couldn't stomach the price of those, but they performed admirably last track day.

 

After lots of research, I settled on the WinMax W2. They seemed to meet all of my needs and have gotten good reviews and were just a small step up from OEM pads. I incorrectly bed them in (treated them like a track pad) initially and glazed the pads. I eventually got them bed in properly and they are exactly what I was looking for, albeit a bit more dust than I was expecting. The car has much better initial bite and stops much harder now. They are great on my spirited drives and I can now give them a much quicker stab to bleed off speed compared to OEM. The extra bite gives more confidence and overall they just fit the car and what it is setup to do. They work great cold, but obviously like to have just a little bit of heat in them. Overall the car with the Winmax 2 pads strikes a better balance (power, handling, grip, braking) and puts the braking up a level to match the rest of the car.

 

Agreed with the Stoptech Sports, initial bite is great, they're more than adequate for a beginner HPDE event if you decide to give it a try, I ran them at Sebring and had fade twice after a few laps of really going at it.
I haven't had any noise from them, but holy hell do they make a lot of dust. I had Akebono pads from Rockauto that were pretty decent, but didn't have that initial bite. But one week of the Stoptechs dust is equivalent to over a month of dust from the Akebonos.

 

For street and Autox Stoptechs are great. I agree that they are not fade resistant enough for hard track use. They dust, but not in the realm of Hawks in my experience, so out of those two at least I would choose stoptech for a street car. My daily driver has them (and had them when I still autocrossed it) and the S2k had them on it until I moved to Hawks last season. Not too sure the Hawks provided much more benefit than the stoptechs really, especially for autocross. But, they do support the sport and nationals :P

 

+1 for Winmax W2, they are great street pads, but they do dust a bit more than I would like. I do have a set of Winmax W3 sitting in my room to be installed, excited to try those out soon. W3 are still considered street pads, but can also fit to do some autox and light track days.

 

guys.

100% street car, he says. Stoptech sports work for light track use....but a 1400F MOT isn't useful to the OP.

Stoptech sports have like...a *little* more bite than stock. Lets be honest, eh?

If y'all think Stoptechs have decent cold temp bite...you haven't tried just a normalass $20 semi-metallic pad.

If he's just looking for cold bite and doesn't mind dust...he's looking for a decent semi-metallic.

Other options: Hawk HP+ and Carbotech AX-6 are low operating temp pads with great cold bite, but shitty high temp capability. Perfect...except the noise part.