So I'm not in a Z anymore but I thought I'd share some thoughts and touch up on some things I said about the Hawk HPS pads earlier in this thread when I still had my Z.
I felt like they lacked in inital bite but still had good stopping power and heat properties for a street car. I drove them hard on The Dragon and they did fine. They didn't dust much and seemed to have a fairly long life and treated the rotors well. The main takeaway for me was that they are a good street pad but just lacked in initial bite.
Now, recently I just changed my brakes on the 5.0... it comes stock with a Ferodo street and light-track compound pad that performs great but dusts like a motherf*cker (can't keep my wheels clean for more than 2 days), eats the rotor, and wears too quickly for a street driven car. I wore the rear pads down to the backing plates at 21k... all street driving!
So I decided to try the HPS again since I liked everything about them on the Z but the initial bite, only this time I mated them to Stillen's slotted rotors. It definitely feels better than when I had them on the Z's blank rotors in terms of the initial pad bite. I'm definitely happy with them as a street setup. If/when I need higher temp properties I will just swap in the Carbotechs, but so far I am really happy with this HPS and Stillen combo on the street.
Yes, yes, I know... the car is getting dropped soon.
