Brake pads

[High Speed]

Whats a good choice for brake pads for the track? and are they ok for the street too?
Harry

[luisimo]

I really like DP Brakes (http://www.dp-brakes.com) I had really good results with them.

[mikeyjudkins]

I have been recommended to use Performance Friction 95 compound pads, or the HRC pads if you have the cash.

[Trackho]

Stock or HRC

[Chuci]

Don't know how they are for racing, but the Galfer Green's seem to have better than stock initial bite and good feel through the rest of the braking cycle. Had them on my F3 and will most likely put them on the F4i. Much less mush factor, esp with braided lines in place too. The best part is they don't seem to tear into the rotors as much as the sintered/full-metallics.

[High Speed]

I started this thread originaly because of brake problems, mainly chattering the front tire. Just got my forks redone a Lindemans and now I don't bottom out the front end under braking and a byproduct is my brakes are 200% better. it just rips the rear tire of the ground now without even trying. Amazing difference! Stock is crap!
Harry

[EastBayDave]

Interesting post; how about a bottom line?

For those recommending pads, what's your lap times at Sears Point, or Thunderhill?

What times do the leaders of your specific class run? (looking for a comparison)

[Max Smiley]

Long Post Follows, pls. read

Interesting thread street or race. there appears more than meets the eye too as I found a snippet on another website below:

-----

text from a Ferodo letter:

When switching from sintered pads (any brand) to the carbon based race pads, it extremely important to do so on properly prepared rotors. It all comes down to deposition layers and material compatibility. FYI: the carbon pads
typically don't perform as well at lower thermal levels as their sintered counterparts.

The following is a copied reply to a similar inquiry regarding the use of sintered pads on iron rotors:

The above was copied and forwarded to us by a Ferodo BrakeTech dealer who thought similarly that confusion indeed exists relative to the questions raised in the letter from Greg Cardenas posted on your site.

As such, we'd like to take a stab at clarifying some basic points on this rather convoluted issue:

There's really two very elemental dynamics in play when it comes to material life expectancy [rotor and pad] at the friction couple: € Friction related abrasion [on the rotor pad track]
€ Thermal stress distortion [i.e.: warping of the rotor and/or backplate] Although this is the simplistic view, I'll focus here since this forms the basis of our recommendations:

1/ MATERIAL ABRASION.
Most sintered metal pads are designed specifically for use on stainless steel rotors which is typically a harder material in general than cast iron. As such, some of these friction materials do indeed gall the rubbing surfaces to
varying degrees. If this occurs on stainless, the softer cast iron will normally suffer to a greater extent. Since there are so many different
sintered materials out in the market (with the vast majority specific to stainless steel) we must as a general rule of thumb recommend to our customers that they not use them on their iron rotors as the potential for premature problems is real and potentially expensive.

2/ THERMAL DYNAMICS.
Regarding sintered pads on Ductile iron, Gray iron, carbon steel or stainless for that matter; using the base assumption that the friction material isn't overly abrasive [causing galling, scoring, etc.], the real issue is thermal capacity. All conventional metals used in rotors have their own thermal dynamics to deal
with; total mass, shape, lightening/venting hole type (placement and quantity) combined with inherent thermal conductivity of the resident material all play an integral role in material stability at peak operating temperatures. What we're essentially talking about here is resistance to distortion [warping, coning, etc.].

This is a complicated and convoluted subject that has few simple answers as there are so many variables to factor in. But one basic truth is that the sintered pads, including our new SinterGrip series, run hotter at the interface than do "most" organic pads...by as much as 150 degrees [F] in our testing. If you're running near the edge of thermal capacity with a particular rotor type and design and high performance / racing organic pads (like the carbon based CP911Star), switching to a racing sintered pad will surely exacerbate the problem. In majority of instances where a problem occurs, thermal stress induced distortion is the culprit.

Another area of potential confusion is the many and significant differences between the classes of iron; the two main categories being primarily the Ductile irons and Grays irons. There simply isn't sufficient room here to expand on those differences here without taking up excessive room...have to leave that for another time.

We manufacture our BrakeTech Superlite rotors from computer controlled Continuous Cast [billet] ductile iron supplied by America's oldest and most experienced foundry specializing in advanced composition cast iron. Cutting from billet is clearly a more expensive process than many others but we do this to have greater control over material matrix, eliminate porosity and have the most consistent micro structure possible. Does all this extra care and material selection guarantee they won't warp? Nope. There's very few guarantee's in this world (outside of death and taxes) and in the rarified atmosphere of racing, even less...we just build our SuperLites to be better than most.

In final answer to Greg's question regarding our recommendation of the Ferodo SinterGrip ST pads on the Superlite rotors; we've dyno tested them extensively and have discovered no significant abrasion related problems with this combination. After over 200 dyno runs, they didn't distort either. But bottom line when it comes to thermal stress distortion; as noted above, there's no guarantee this won't happen under the right circumstances.

Hope this provides some insight.

--
Jeff Gehrs
Ferodo BrakeTech USA
909-471-3476

http://ferodobraketech.com
*****************************

text from user:

After reading this reply a couple times, I decided that:

1) If you are running iron rotors, don't use Sintered pads, as the wear rates are significantly higher.

2) If you've already installed Sintered pads, you should stay with them because re-prepping the rotors is a PITA.

3) Sintered pads leave deposits on your rotors which won't allow Carbon based pads to preform to their potential.

4) Carbon pads do work well, and run cooler than equivalent Sintered offerings. Side benefit for iron rotor users - Their low metal content shouldn't allow the pads to rust to the rotor's surface.
----

my text :p

I'm running EBC HH's once again and note the Ferodo info may be biased slightly. No idea what the stock brembo pads were but guessing they were also metallic / sintered. less concerned about wear, very concerned about braking power as I sometimes do stupid stuff. regarding heat build-up and toasting the fluid, well I recently bled four times, with twice in as many days, so to me fluid is very expendable in return for top braking all the time.

I don't know about the various race rules, classifications or anyone else's motivations or restrictions but like as they say the only things between the road and you are the tires, so goes the only thing stopping you is your braking system.

[Chuci]

Originally posted by winders
Galfer Greens are okay for the street (I'd rather run EBC HH SIntered) but not a good race pad. They get too hot and fade....

Scott
I had GG's on my F3 before and they felt great, although never ran them on the track. If I'm doing the occasional trackday and not racing, will the GG's still be okay or will they overheat there as well? I'm looking for something that won't chew the rotors and still give solid feedback.

[Holeshot]

Well I'm running Wave Rotors (Galfer) and Galfer pads. They're so-so. I switched to EBC HH race pads after having the rotors bead blasted and they worked good for a few laps of Sunday practice and were just not as powerfull as I had hoped in the race.

I'm still searching. The Braking USA wave rotors with their pads on the 600 are awesome. I like the Galfer guys, but they're not helping me get into the corner any better. I'm selling the Waves and getting some EBC pro-lites I think.

1:40's (on the 600) at Sears (1:42's) on the GSX-R1000

1:58's (157.99, seriously) at T-hill this last time round.

My brakes are still seriously not great. I'm gonna try -2 lines, and EBC prolites, and not sure on pads.

Open to suggestions...

[luisimo]

Originally posted by Max Smiley
...
regarding heat build-up and toasting the fluid, well I recently bled four times, with twice in as many days, so to me fluid is very expendable in return for top braking all the time
...


I used to have the same problem until I started using Synpower brake fluid (http://www.valvoline.com/pages/products/product_detail.asp?Product=51) which it has a boiling point up to 500°F :teeth

[EastBayDave]

Originally posted by Holeshot
1:40's (on the 600) at Sears (1:42's) on the GSX-R1000
1:58's (157.99, seriously) at T-hill this last time round.
My brakes are still seriously not great. I'm gonna try -2 lines, and EBC prolites, and not sure on pads.
Open to suggestions...

Those are some great times dude; really!

If you got the bux, how bout some serious brakes? Like AP/Lockheed, Brembo's, or similar?

You can looks at some of them at this local site:

http://www.ema-usa.com/

Oh....& the smartass in me says: "anytime your on the brakes, your not on the gas..."

:teeth

[morthrane]

Mmmm... Brembo four pad four piston brakes. :thumbup

[Holeshot]

Hey THanks Dave. It's a compliment coming from a former fast guy!

[Max Smiley]

my fav ATE Super Blue (http://www.volvospeed.com/Reviews/ate.htm) is also rated in excess of 500 degrees dry and the wet number is pretty damn good too. I have both the blue and the gold to alternate flushes, great stuff.

I'd like to add for those adding race products to street bikes to watch out and bump up the maintenance itervals. race machines get worked on very frequently (you'll never find one with a year old brake fluid let alone more than one race old ideally). some race fluids are extremely hydroscopic and I've read they can pull in moisture from just about anywhere in the system - through lines (rubber), past piston seals, etc. that might explain the huge air buble I got out of my left caliper post 1k ride, as the lever was hard as a rock before leaving.

anyways, watch yourselves, the caveat applies to all these street driven 520 chain conversions too.



morth~ mmm, $100 in parts for front pad swaps... :p damn dealer pricing. :rolleyes

my kawi had six piston tokico's and tokico HH's, later EBC HH's w/kevlar lines and stopped really hard. about the same modulation feel as the brembos on the mille but my memory is getting fuzzy...

[donoman]

This is kinda off-topic, but man when I changed the brakelines to SS lines on the RC, it felt like I had the Brakes of God.

[Max Smiley]

see, and you were questioning the upgrade! did you go street or the race size? smaller lines will give more instant feel and pull (less fluid volume to push around). hows the modulation? I give up trying to brake/blip/downshift and will just brake/roll-on/downshift. not like I'm racing around anyways :p

[Sage]

Performance Friction pads are used by almost all the factory teams (the sticker on the side of the bike lies) I haven't tried them my self but they must work?