Carquest Wearever Platinum Professional Ceramic brake pads

I just installed these 3 weeks ago. I went for the ceramics over the semi-metallic because the semi-metallic pads I was replacing lasted all of 22k miles. I wasn't sure why that was and wanted something that was going to last longer.

It all started with a commotion on the way home from a lengthy trip that was loud and scary enough that I pulled into the first parts store I came across, an Advance Auto Parts, and came away with the pads listed in the title. Carquest Wearever Platinum Ceramic brake pads. Well, when I installed them myself a few days later, I discovered that I had a stuck caliper. The pads on the other wheel were fine and that was what killed the set in just 22k miles. So I replaced the caliper too.

Fast forward 2 weeks. This past weekend I was in the mountains of West Virginia with a heavily loaded minivan; my dirtbike was on a rear hitch carrier and a large cargo box on the roof. And boy, those ceramics faded big time. Now my rotors are drilled and slotted - I knew I was going to be loaded heavily in the future so I had premium brakes installed way back when. But those ceramics just didn't cut. Props to Advance Auto though, they exchanged the metallics for the premium semi metallics without even a receipt after I managed to get the bar code # from the first set (they did require that).

Just wanted to put this out there on the Internet for other people's future reference. I was looking for reviews after I got home with the metallics and didn't really find anything. I haven't got around to installing the semi-metallics yet but if there are other issues there, I'll go ahead and modify this post. I'm not expecting any.

I think the ceramics would be fine for those who don't do mountain driving. They certainly didn't dust but they did require much more pedal pressure. And no squeal whatsoever. They have a lot going for them but all in all I like the semi-metallics better - except for the dust they create. As this was the first set of metallics I've ever had, I just didn't know any better.