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Looking at putting brakes on my 2001 Subaru Outback.
What's the scoop on the different materials they are made of?
Is one actually better then the other?
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It depends. A good sign is that the pad & rotor are not made in China but finding non-Chinese brake parts may be harder than you thought.
The majority of your brake pad is actually the same shit Tums & Rolaids is made from; calcium carbonate. It's a cheap filler. Add in some glass fiber, steel chip, carbon, some other misc. materials depending on what sort of harmonics, heat range, and density you want, phenolic resins and you have a brake pad ready for the oven. The thing is that a specific formula developed for a light car will have fade issues with a heavier car. A more aggressive compound will chew thru rotors, have unacceptable noise, or will wear too quickly. It's all a balancing act but not very difficult to formulate. The hard part is what OTC pad to buy? If I can recommend anything, it would be whatever isn't Chinese sourced. That way you better your odds for getting a pad material that was tested for an application similar to yours and not developed for some random communistic shitbox or dump truck. That's why some ChiCom brakes just plain old suck; while they fit, sorta, the pad material was designed for a different application or they fucked up the manufacturing process (which is pretty easy to do if you're the type to cut corners).
Brands? Akebono aftermarket stuff is pretty good as they bought the Bosch's aftermarket division 5 years ago or so. Performance Friction, Carbotech, Hawk, certain Raybestos products, and European brands like Pagid, Jurid, and ATE make good stuff as well. If you're looking for the best cheap brake pads; the Napa stuff is pretty good as well. New Bosch & Bendix stuff is Chinese.
I used to work in the industry as a consultant. It's been a while but not much has changed aside from who bought who and what is being made where.