turning rotors

[DreKat]

A few weeks back I removed the wheeles off of the Kat so that I could do some painting. I removed the rotors and labeled each one for the right and the left. The rotors ae still in great shape but I was wondering if it would hurt to swap then to eather side?

[Black_peter]

Wouldn't hurt, but I don't see any advantage either, well it would change the direction of the stresses, kind of evening it out.

[KeWLKaT]

Wouldn't hurt, but I don't see any advantage either, well it would change the direction of the stresses, kind of evening it out.

... which could lead to bad things like faster material fatigue.

[Black_peter]

Or slower, like the carrier rivets will wear more evenly. The inner face of the mounting holes will now be stressed the other way. Aluminum doesn't stress fatigue like other metals.

[steves]

I thought turning rotors meant machining them back to flat again?

[Black_peter]

That's what I thought when I read the title too..

[scottynoface]

That's what I thought when I read the title too..

+1, I see a lathe in my head.

[HemiKat]

I removed my rotors to paint my wheels (they were originally pink!) and I mixed them up when I put them back on.... The pulsated like crazy when I slowed, so I had to swap them back, but my rotors are exactly in great shape.

[jdm5770]

I thought turning rotors meant machining them back to flat again?

Ditto...which leads me to ask, could you do that with bike rotors? My gut says no, but you never know.

[crazyaussie]

Ditto...which leads me to ask, could you do that with bike rotors? My gut says no, but you never know.

I believe you can, that's why there is a MIN. thickness marking on the rotors. Finding a shop to do it though has proven to be the hard part though.

As for swapping left and right rotors; when I took mine off to paint the front rim I didn't note which rotor went to what side, so I just guessed and haven't had any issues with them. Either I guessed the correct side, or you can swap them without much hassle.

[scottynoface]

I think the only issue with it would be that after a while the rotors form to the pads, so once that gets sorted out it should work right?

[tone]

None drilled discs can be swapped side to side but in general drilled discs should not be, hence the L & R stamped into the carrier

The reason for this is that the holes in the disc are drilled in a particular pattern to aid the clearing of water & dust from the pads surface under braking

[Cheriff]

It wouldn't be hard to turn these on a lathe. If I were doing it I would first just machine another piece which fits into a collet one side and has threaded holes on the other for mounting the rotor. After that it would be a matter of whether there is enough material left. I would imagine that places that "can't" do it, don't want to take the time to machine up the mount piece.

[BobCarter]

in my experience from running my automotive garage. No rotors with slots or cross drilled can be resurfaced. It would tear up the bits on the machine and just result in a really crappy finish. The minimum thickness spec is for rotor wear. Over time, rotors do wear some...at least on cars that is. European cars wear through rotors just like pads. One set of pads equals a new set of rotors every brake job. just my .02cents

[Kfreak]

in my experience from running my automotive garage. No rotors with slots or cross drilled can be resurfaced. It would tear up the bits on the machine and just result in a really crappy finish. The minimum thickness spec is for rotor wear. Over time, rotors do wear some...at least on cars that is. European cars wear through rotors just like pads. One set of pads equals a new set of rotors every brake job. just my .02cents

That's what I thought about the min. thickness. Inspections have a min thickness on the rotors, anything below that rating needs to be changed.