Carbon ceramic to steel?

There are steel replacement rotors for the carbon calipers. New pads of course. Girodisc is the most popular. There are other vendors but here is the system for reference: https://www.fabspeed.com/ferrari-f430-challenge-girodisc-brake-rotors/

 

no, it’s not complicated. The problem is that the carbon rotors are huge compared to the stock steel rotors and to get steel ones that fit properly, it’s not cheap.
That said, why do you want to change out? Carbon rotors and pads should last almost a lifetime of just plain street driving.

 

Bryan- A thousand a corner is way less than replacement CCMs.

 

I've sold my previous F430 with 48.000km and according to my Ferrari dealership, CCB wear was a whopping.. 8%! During my ownership I drove 5000km and I wasn't really gentle (even used it at Monza). Don't go for the steel ones they're simply rubbish, prior buying my F430 I drove a friend's one with steel brakes and my goodness the brake pedal became hard after 5 minutes of intense use (it's not funny when the brakes don't do their job just behind a corner).

It's hard to find CCB at the end of their life so just look for the right F430 with CCB (have them checked at Ferrari) and ENJOY IT!

 

The chief mechanic told the ccm brakes would outlast the car if driven on the road.

 

The CS and 430 use second-generation carbon ceramic brakes. They will last a very long time even if you track the car. The pads are expensive, but no worse than buying a good set of steel rotors and pads together. The replacement of carbon rotors for steel is usually done when you have a car that is excessively tracked to reduce the cost of pads, not usually for rotors. However, you could damage the ceramic rotors with too many heat cycles, which shouldn't happen on a street car or a car that is driven a few times a year on a track. The computer keeps track of this and is actually how you get the % worn of the rotors. Technically you need to weigh the rotors on carbon ceramics, but the heat cycle-based calculation from the computer is supposed to be a good judge of when the rotors may need replacing.

Now early Porsche carbon ceramic brakes are a completely different story and why some people have a bad taste for carbon ceramic brakes and how expensive they can be to own. I ordered my 2004 GT3 with Carbon brakes based on the promise of handling improvements, no dust, and durability. Very quickly after the first GT3s were delivered we all learned that Porsche would not honor the warranty on the rotors if you tracked the car. Some people were getting less than a "season" out of the carbon ceramic rotors tracking their cars on weekends. So you have cars with a few thousand miles that needed rotors that could cost, at the time, up to 20k in 2005 dollars. Needless to say, I pulled my rotors when the stories started to appear and put them away with about 3k miles on my car. I wasn't tracking the car, it was my daily driver at the time but I was afraid of a 20k bill since carbon brakes were new and no one knew yet how they would really wear on the street other than Porsche saying they should outlast the car, which they apparently didn't in some situations. The next-generation carbon ceramic rotors which came out in the next-generation GT3, did not have the same track wear problem and I think were available either on the 997.1 GT3 or 997.2 GT3, not sure because I never owned one of those. I still own the 2004 GT3, and when I needed new rotors, I did not put them back on, I put on Girodisc rotors.

With Ferrari, I wouldn't hesitate to get the better than "Porsche" Carbon Ceramic brakes. In fact, when I was looking for my 430, it was a requirement since I never heard anything in my research about Ferrari Carbon Ceramic brakes wearing out early and costing owners $$$, it was usually crash damage or a mistake by a mechanic costing a new set of rotors. I guess when people start hitting 200k miles/320k km on their 430, we will see some cars that need rotors due to wear

 

You make have to change the caliper pistons as the origin ones are aluminium

 

I have the CCM’s on my 2009 and was told the same thing. They will outlast the car when it’s driven only on the street. If you are going to regularly track the car, it may be worth swapping to steels rotors and changing the calipers.

 

The Brembo OEM rotors become rough when used hard on track (it's not that they pass the weight limit which is supposed to be the real wear limit). On my 488 they needed replacement after 15,000 km (less than 10,000 miles) - a 430 is "slower" than a 488 so may not be as demanding on the brakes, but I doubt they will last much more if used hard on track ; I switched to Surface Transforms CC brakes and Pagid pads, which is a far better combination (far less fading and far less wear, on both rotors and pads).
The software guessing the wear of the OEM rotors cannot do miracles, it's pretty inaccurate.
It's still true that with pure road use the OEM equipment will usually last a very long time.

 

The ccm caiplers do not need to be changed when doing the iron rotor. BUT THE PADS DO.

 

Its not wear thats really going to cost you money with CCB's its damage or potential damage. A stone getting in, which happens more than you would think! If it happens on a steel rotor, nothing will really happen, might hear it, might not, and it just gets spat out. On a Carbon ceramic disc it will ruin it. Ask me how I know (that was on a 997 Turbo though) needed a new disc at £1800, oh and if you follow the dealers advice you "should" replace them in pairs. On a 996 Turbo I had a tyre fitter drop the wheel on a rotor and took a chip out of it. Never noticed until a few days later and they denied all knowledge of it. It still worked of course, but it was compromised, you knew it was there, looked rubbish, and needed a new rotor, again £1800!

Now F430 rotors last time I checked are circa £2000+, +VAT each for fronts.

Mine came with CCM's and being a road car, I took them off and put steels on. They are more than enough for the road. Trouble is the fronts look feeble, so I am going Giro fronts with CCB callipers. I'm told they are fit and forget, perform just as good and no more worries over the Carbon rotors.

 

One thing about Girodisc I learned with my GT3, make sure you order them with the zinc coating, you may have to call them directly to order that way.

If you don't get them coated, you will be stuck with the very annoying job of painting the areas of the rotor not swept by the pad with high temp paint. This will avoid rusting in the small area between the sweeping surface and the hat. it will also avoid rust in the grooves. I was told Girodic used to zinc coat all their rotors, but stopped a few years ago because the coating will wear off for track use. Trust me, they look terrible with surface rust within a few minutes of washing the car if you don't blow dry the rotors or if you drive through a puddle. Painting the rotor's rustable areas was a giant pain with all the masking involved to keep silver paint off the dark blue hat. In retrospect, I should have pulled the rotors and sent them to be coated.

 

I swapped the ceramic rotors on my scud to giro disc steel. For me, the factory ceramics were lacking in stopping power even with upgraded pagid pads. I was finding myself having to extend the braking zone on track and even on the mountains had to be more cautious on the brakes. However, my comparison was to my 997.2 gt3 which had an aggressive track pad. I’m very happy with the giro disc steel conversion with their street/track pad.

 

My Front Scud CCM worn out at 17,000 miles. Fwiw

 

How much of the 17,000 miles were track miles?