Porsche Tungsten Carbide Brake Rotors

Rotors coated in tungsten carbide mean better performance, less wear, less brake dust, and no rust.

On most modern cars, brake rotors are made from either cast iron or carbon ceramic materials. But Porsche has recently implemented another type of brake rotor that's set to revolutionize the industry, using a material called tungsten carbide.

The brake rotors, which the company calls Porsche Surface Coated Brakes (or PSCB), are iron rotors that receive a layer of super-hot tungsten carbide applied to the contact surface at an extremely high rate of speed. The result is a 0.1-millimeter coating of wildly dense material. According to Porsche, the rotors last 30 percent longer than their iron counterparts, despite the thin layer of useful material.

And that's not all. Because so little of the rotor actually wears throughout its service life, PSCBs produce around 90 percent less brake dust, according to Road & Track contributor Jason Fenske. The tungsten carbide coating also allows the rotors to maintain cooler temperatures after repeated hard stops.

The PSCBs are meant to fall in between Porsche's basic cast-iron systems and its full-blown carbon ceramic systems in terms of price and performance. Fenske managed to get some pricing quotes for the Cayenne Coupe he had on loan for this video, and found the replacement cost for the tungsten carbide-equipped system was about a third of the price of the carbon ceramics.

Brian Silvestro is Hearst Autos' Lead Deputy Editor for rankings content. He spent over seven years as a staff writer for Road & Track Magazine, and still contributes regularly with car reviews, industry interviews, and more.

He also has a taste for high-mileage, rusted-out projects and amateur endurance racing.

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