Rotora Big Brake Kit Product Review

This review is for my 4th gen 4Runner but these guys also make the same front rotor kit for the 3rd gen Tacoma.

After adding the heavy 285 Nitto Ridge Grapplers, full skid plates, the OEM brakes were just not cutting it. I could feel the additional weight every single time I depressed the brake pedal. It simply took more effort to slow the vehicle down. In addition to the sticking calipers, the shimmy due to warped rotors, (due to the vehicle weight and living on a mountain), and in anticipation of adding a winch bumper, sliders, roof rack, etc... I started looking into aftermarket solutions.

Big brake kits are not cheap. Many folks are not keen on spending thousands on bigger brakes and this is clearly not an upgrade for everyone. I spoke with Loren at Rotora and ordered the 14” front and rear rotors with forged aluminum calipers and stainless lines. Installation went without a hitch. Rotora brake pads are now bedded.

Arguments against BBK:
-OEM system is adequate
-Once ABS kicks in BBK do nothing more to slow the vehicle down

Counter arguments:
-Even with OEM wheels and tires, sticking rusted calipers, warped rotors, and fade seem to be a regular problem secondary to heat. Add bigger tires, trail armor, any amount of towing and the OEM system which is already struggling is easily overwhelmed. Adding larger rotors provides a bigger heat sink and results in less fade with repeated use. Pushing the lever arm out with larger rotors and calipers will assist with slowing the vehicle and require less effort in terms of pedal pressure to do so. Threshold braking obviously takes far less effort.
-Engaging ABS occurs faster and takes less effort.

Initial impressions:

Packaging: 10/10. Everything came packaged in press fit and precisely cut styrofoam.

Quality: 10/10. Amazing quality. Caliper brackets are billet aluminum hard anodized black. Powder coated red finish on the calipers is spotless.

Weight: 9/10. Rotor weight was reduced in the front despite being larger thanks to the two piece aluminum hat. Rotor weight in the rear was increased as they are significantly larger than OEM. See pics.

Install: 10/10. Straight forward. Remove OEM rotors and calipers. Cut dust shields, (or remove them and place washers between caliper brackets and hub). Install Rotora rotors, caliper brackets, calipers and lines. Bleed system.

Pedal feel: 10/10. Takes significantly less effort to slow the vehicle. Zero fade after repeated slowing from 50-5mph x 10 attempts.

Emergency braking: 10/10. Tires skid with less effort and ABS kicks in sooner.

Overall: 10/10. Tremendous improvement over the OEM system.

 

What made you go with rotora over Stoptech or Wilwood?
Why Cross drilled? If you wanted more heat sink, wouldn’t slotted be better with More material?
Do you plan on upgrading the master cylinder?

 

Wilwood has a nice front kit. I don’t believe they have anything for the rear. Stoptech is a good option. Difference being one piece vs two piece rotors. I wanted to go bigger and try to save rotational weight if possible.

Honestly, I chose cross drilled vs slotted primarily for style. These rotors will never see track use “off gassing” to make a difference. Off road slotted might be better to clean off mud.

Upgrading the master cylinder is an option to maximize the potential benefit of running bigger calipers and additional pistons. I believe the biggest benefit of this kit is already achieved by moving the lever arm out however.

 

So you don’t change any of the front / rear bias with this kit? I would think that you’d need to adjust the rear bias on the brakes when converting from drum to disk, but I’ve never looked at the specs of the OEM master, so can’t say for sure. With ABS / Crawl / stability control its all wheel speed monitored so I would think all that works well, but normal braking I wonder if the bias is correct / needs changing for optimal performance.

 

Don’t forget steel braided brake lines

You’d be surprised at how something as simple as brakes lines can drastically improve pedal feel and brake response.

...just sayin’

 

Why is this in the 3rd gen forum?
Looks like you have a 4 runner. Do they have a kit for second gen tacomas as well?

Link?
Interested in checking out the kit. I’ve been looking at the SOS performance BBK and would like to see how they compare

 

His pics are of a 4th gen 4Runner which has discs all around stock.

 

Dam, I’m blind as a bat, for too busy looking at the brakes to look at the vehicle.

 

Yeah not sure if Rotora has a rear disc conversion for our drum setups. That’s why I want kinda confused.

 

4th gen and 5th gen 4runners and 2nd gen and 3rd gen tacos share the same front brake system. I didn’t realize the rears on the tacos are drums.

 

I would like to do big brakes. Those look nice. Thanks for the write up.

 

Curious why you didn't try (maybe you did though) changing out the brake pads first before upgrading the whole brake kit. If it's over heating a lot couldn't you just buy a set of pads that is grippier or that excels in a higher temp range? Just curious, I'm still learning myself and have thought about doing something like this for the fronts.

 

Agree. If you feel the OEM brakes are adequate go for stainless lines and grippier pads. For the 4th gen 4runners the calipers and rotors are the big issue. Calipers rust and the pistons seize up. The pad ends up sticking to the rotor. I read a few reports of this issue affecting the 5th gen 4runners as well. I live on a mountain. 3 miles, 5000 lb vehicle at 30-45 deg incline. If the brakes are undersized unfortunately no pad is going to save the rotors from warping regardless of proper bed in procedure. Wife’s 2015 Acura MDX rotors also warped at 10k miles despite engine braking on a regular.

 

Everything looks/works nice when its new,lots of guys wont want to change wheels for larger diameter disc's,give it 6 months and report back.

 

I’d put a small sum on this guy working for that company, just spam posting around the web on all forums vaguely related to 4runners.

 

Will do!

Nope. We share the same platform and a TON of parts including brakes. The Rotora brake kit is a nice upgrade available for the Tacoma. Some already have the kit but don’t bother posting reviews outside of their build threads.

 

OK, that's fair, not to be bossy, but I would strongly recommend started such a thread with "They also make a full 4 wheel kit for 3rd gen tacomas" to establish relevance early. As you can see, we trigger easily with off topic posts...

 

No sweat. I edited the first post to reflect what you just stated.

 

Yes, slotted would be better. To go from drum to disc rear, a master cylinder upsize is strongly recommended. However, from everything I have been able to determine, if you upsize your master, you loose the electronic booster required to operate ATRAC if you have a TRD OR or Pro model. The electronic boosted cylinders are also more performant than the standard cylinders found on the other model Tacoma’s.

I’ve never heard of Rotora, and I am relatively familiar with brake companies. Judging by their website and their soliciting of customer vehicles for R&D I’d say they are relatively new. Seems a bit surprising though that donating your vehicle for R&D only gets you “a discount” on the brakes they developed using your vehicle.

 

They have been around a while, but more prominent in the car scene. I actually went with slotted rotors on my BBK thanks to your forum post
I didn’t want to get into the whole master cylinder change and open up a can of worms with the crawl control.