I have always gone with Akebono pads and centric rotors. It's a great combo.
I've used Akebono Euro Ceramic pads on my MK7.5 R and S5 Sportback and they were great and basically no dust.
I used to have an IS350 and with the genuine Lexus pads on, an insane amount of brake dust and squealing. Replaced with Akebono Performance ultra premium ceramics and never had an issue with noise or dust afterwards.
My Mercedes is much older W210, but for the brakes I went with Zimmerman Coat Z rotors and Akebono Euro ceramic pads. The front pads have been on for about 30k miles and are not even close to needing replacement. And they leave almost no brake dust, so my wheels look clean all the time now. Only real downside is they have a bit less initial bite than the oem pads, but I have actually come to prefer the more linear braking feel and haven't had any problems with stopping power.
I have been running Akebono on most all of my cars and have 3-400k worth of driving on them. I tried some semi-metallic pads once. Loved loved loved the initial grab, but hated hated hated the dust and the way they wore the rotors. If I was tracking, I wouldn't run the Akebono's, though. There are better pads for that. As someone mentioned, the Akebono's don't have as much of an initial grab as they need to heat up. I did try the Pagid pads once that I got from the now defunct BavAuto. They were just OK.
I run AkiBono pads with Brembo rotors on both of our E39’s and both E46’s ( and Volvo xc90 ???? home depot use-free vehicle) and love the setup. On the E46’s very similar feel to OE Jurid or Pagid and on the E39’s ( US spec 2003 540/6 and 2001 530 sport auto) softer initial bite yet excellent braking with great modulation and stopping power, quiet, long lasting, minimal rotor wear and the light dust is barely noticeable, easily rinses off and is non-caustic.
For brakes, you're limited to whatever you can fit with your wheels.. I doubt you'd fit Brembo's with them, so you may be limited to 4pot/2pot or just rebuilding your current calipers with good street pads and rotors.
On my WRX, I use Dixcel ES pads front and rear
Upgraded rotors (paragon 2 piece) and dixcel type z pads.
I'm in the "Akebono are not better" camp and I have done some extensive testing.For a ceramic pad, yes, the Akebono are better than ceramic competitors. However, they do not have as much bite as the semi-metallic pads. This is something that can't be debated, they can't bite as hard as the semi-metallic compound.I too hate brake dust and tried the Akebono pads on my wife's VW and I immediately noticed that they didn't bite as hard as the OE pads. That same week, I ordered the OE pads and it fixed the problem.I've also tried the Akebono on an E350 and I came to the same conclusion. I actually think the EBC Red ceramics may bite a little more (when new) than the Akebono. However, the EBC reds always left this weird deposit on rotors that would make it feel like they were warped and they would need to be turned down.
Very surprised that you guys are fans of Akebonos... Had them in the wife's Z4 and found the initial bite and overall braking performance to be much much weaker than the OEM BMW pads... It was bad to the point that I removed them a couple months in and just got Pagid pads for it...
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