[XtremeRevolution]

Personally as far as stopping power, the rears wont do much at all as the fronts will. Secondly...discs are much easier to work on. So if I wanted to convert mine from drums to discs...I would in a new York minute. All I need to do is get the rear axle assy with all the brakes **** on it from the LTZ's and yank mine out and put the other in and whala lol. Third..im not sure why GM is still doing this drum brake **** to begin with. I would of thought they do away with that long ago.

I think the number is somewhere around 80% front, 20% rear. Consider that the difference between rears is so small at that point that it is a fraction of 20%. Pretty small really.

Discs are easier to work on, but then you have the common issue of rusted sliders (on older vehicles), warping rotors (not as common with drums), and pad life. Drum shoes often last over 120k miles.

The drum brakes disconnect more cleanly than the disc brakes do, from what I've heard. That, and our drums are FAR larger than what GM has used in the past. Consider that if GM is still doing this, there is probably a good reason for it. They work.

I have driven GM cars with both disc/drum and disc/disc setups. The disc/disc setups handle multiple, repeated stops better than disc/drums. Disc/drums catch quicker when wet. For a single emergency stop either will do just fine. I have made emergency stops with both setups, including in my ECO MT. This car will stop on a dime compared to most other cars on the road. So unless you're towing or carrying heavy loads the disc/drum configuration on the ECO and lower trims is more than sufficient.

Drum brakes are cheaper - thus the reason to use them.

Agreed. My car will also stop on a dime. It is noted that if anyone has poor braking performance (as did one friend on Facebook), they seriously need to adjust their rear brake drums as they may not be adjusted at all from the factory (as my friend's were). Adjusting them resolves all of those issues.

To add to what you said, the drums function very well for a single emergency stop. If you need to make constant, repeated emergency stops, you have a problem bigger than your brakes.

 

[XtremeRevolution]

Better pads and larger rotors will be my attack plan. The Cruze's rotors are small and the brake pads don't handle heat well (but they are quiet).

I will never use drilled rotors again - I cracked one. Slotted rotors just chew up brake pads. They're really both just to look "cool".

X2 on that and just going with a high quality set of blanks. Cyro treated rotors are out there. That's what I'll be doing as well.

Drilled or slotted? Nope, nope, nope. Useless. I don't care what anyone says or what they think they noticed when they change their brakes, slotted and drilled rotors are just plain useless. No benefit whatsoever, and the next person who tells me that they "clean the pad" better or "eliminate water" will get a virtual smack.

 

[XtremeRevolution]

There are some mountain roads in the county I live in that will give disc/drum combinations a really hard time, even without emergency stopping. These roads are steep, low speed, and with a large number of very sharp switchbacks. On one of these roads my Pontiac Transport (disc/drum) would always come out of the canyon sans brakes. It would take about half a mile for the brakes to start working again. On the other hand my Pontiac Montana towing a 3,000 lb trailer never had problems. I haven't taken my Cruze on this road yet so I don't know how the disc/drums it has will fare. I suspect it will be more like my Montana because of the manual transmission.

I was going to wait to try this myself, but Smorey noted that Amsoil Dot3 brake fluid actually provides very significant improvements in braking. I wonder if that has anything to with it.

I'm planning on bleeding mine some time this year to get the Amsoil fluid in there. Never would have thought it would make a difference but he says it was pretty big.

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