Hi,
I took my 03 WRX in for a 60k service a couple of weeks ago. Before that, I had pretty serious vibration during braking. During the service, they replaced the pads, and surfaced the rotors. Afterwards, the brakes worked pretty good with no vibration. This week however, its coming back, mostly while braking from hwy speeds. Could it be that the rotors should have been replaced rather then resurfaced? If so, any rec's for rotors and how much they cost? Possibility of a more serious problem?

Thanks in advance.

 

Once rotors are cut they lose some material and thus their full ability to dissipate heat, which is why there is a minimum thickness below which they must be discarded. The WRX rotors do not have much extra "meat" on them to start with, only a small amount can be cut from them before the minimum thickness is reached. Also once a rotor warps, if that is what happened, the temper of the metal may be lost so just making it flat again doesn't fix it for long, the problem will tend to come back. It's possible that your rotors should have been replaced to begin with rather than cut.
Take it back to the dealer or shop that did the work, there should be a warranty on what they did so even if you do need new rotors the labor to install them would cost you nothing.

 

it's very rare to see a truly "warped" rotor, in most cases the surface becomes uneven because of material exchange between the pad and rotor. at high temps material from the pad can bond to the rotor, causing the surface to become uneven and hence, vibration. another thing to consider is that it's possible that it's something else in the driveline, however unlikely, because it's only apparent under braking. good thing to do would be to give the bearings and suspension components a check just to see if there's anything blatantly wrong. otherwise, take it somewhere else and have the rotors checked.

 

Thanks guys, can I assume if the vibration occurs also during braking when I've got my clutch pressed in, that this excludes a driveline problem?
Thanks.

 

Sounds more like wheel balance. If the balance is slightly out, it can be more apparent under braking