I am pretty mechanical and do pretty much all my own maintenance. Nonetheless, I am at my wits end with this problem and am really hoping someone out there has encountered this issue before and can give me some advice on how to fix it.


A few months ago I found that one or both of my front brake rotors were warped. I didn't particularly care for any of the available brake rotors from Harley so I found an aftermarket set of polished brake rotors for my 2008 Ultra Classic. I installed them and a new set of front brake pads. For the first week or two everything was great... then I started to notice this slight ringing sound coming from the rotors when I was backing my motorcycle out of my garage. This progressed into an extremely loud ringing during braking but only at very slow speed just before I came to a complete stop. Occasionally there will be a slight squealing sound which one would periodically hear from normal brake operation from trapped dirt or brake dust. I ended up removing the brake parts and cleaning the hell out of them but to no avail. The ringing was still there.


After the cleaning I spoke with a tech at my local Harley dealership. He says that this is completely normal with polished rotors as it takes a long time for the polished surface to wear into the normal braking surface you would find on non polished rotors. I was skeptical but decided to deal with the noise a little longer.

Eventually I got fed up with it and ended up back at Harley to replace both the front rotors with Harley rotors. When I told the parts guy my issue he suggested sanding the brake pad surface with a 400 or 600 grit sand paper. His theory was that maybe whatever compound was used to polish the rotor became embedded in the brake pad. I am a machinist so I understand how polish and other things can become embedded in metallic surfaces so I considered his theory plausible. I tried lightly sanding the brake pads and the sound went away for about a week but then slowly came back.

Since changing the surface of the pad had some effect I decided to replace them with a completely new set. I installed a new set and the ringing persists albeit not a much as before.


So, as I stated earlier, I am ready to drop the money for a new set of Harley rotors at this point but would really appreciate any opinions or experience those out there may have with this. I now have about 1100 miles on the new rotors and would think by this point any breaking in would be done. Also, I do not notice any deficiency on braking ability. Stopping power is great and I have no problem getting my antilocks to lock up if I squeeze hard enough.


Thanks!

 

I had the exact same problem. My rotors warped so I bought some polished ones online and some sintered pads. Mine would ring so bad that I could use the front brakes. I replaced the pads with a standard cheap set and they are a lot better. I still get a slight noise when I first start but its 95% better. Only thing I know to do to stop it completely is to go back to non polished rotors but I can deal with it like it is now with no problems.

 

The ringing is probably caused by momentary skidding of the pads on the rotor. I can well imagine it could take a high mileage to wear the surface down enough to stop doing it. Vanity has it's price!