[solo40oz]

I was able to participate in a cadillac performance lab at the F1 track today (circuit of the americas near Austin for those of you living under a rock). It was pretty awesome...got to drive a CTS V around the track and also got to do some skid pad type stuff in the new ATS (didn't expect much from the ATS going in, but was very impressed after I drove it). So anyway, an engineer from Brembo was there giving a presentation and I asked why the roller skate pads were required on the SS but not the CTS. He sort of laughed and called them the 'Mickey mouse ears'.......and here is what i think i heard...apparently before the Camaro was released, GM was toying with the idea of making the Brembos an upgrade option, but at the last minute decided to make them standard...and that adequate noise testing was not performed before the release. When they realized that noise was a problem, they added the weights to the pads, because the caliper part couldn't be changed (I guess the weight/balance like this would normally be integrated into the caliper).

Another interesting tid bit of info is that it sounds like 'brake by wire' may become mainstream in the next 10 years...sounds like a better failsafe needs to be developed for that before it goes into production cars.....