Cooking with Brembo....warning! Dumbness inside.

[Stevedotmil]

Well here are the pictures of the damage that can be done if you cook your brakes and the pads crystalize. I should be ordering new front brake rotors and pads soon. My car is less than 100 miles from hitting 30,000 miles and I'm actually surprised it took this long. All but 7,000 miles have been here in Germany. In the states you won't have this problem as much unless you are trying to track your car with stock parts. Here in Germany it's a different story. This can happen more often just driving around.


brakes 1 by steveinfante, on Flickr
This is on the car.


brakes 7 by steveinfante, on Flickr
Glazed pad


brakes 6 by steveinfante, on Flickr
After I cleaned one off. The bottom pad is the clean one. Notice the crystallization.


brakes 5 by steveinfante, on Flickr
brakes 4 by steveinfante, on Flickr
Outside surface of one rotor.


brakes 3 by steveinfante, on Flickr
brakes 2 by steveinfante, on Flickr
Partially cleaned off. This is as clean as I could get them without having them turned. There are a couple spots where there is pitting.


Here's the moral of the story kids. Don't go racing or performance driving without having the proper gear. I should have just bought some race pads for the fun days. I'm not a fan of trying to use "street/race" pads. These were the stock Track Pack(BOSS compound) pads. A proper race pad like the Hawk DTC-60 or 70 would have been a much better option. Get some quality rotors that are SLOTTED and not DRILLED. I'm not sure what heat rating these are good for but I'm sure I went way past it. Stopping a Mustang like this on the Autobahn at triple digit speeds on a regular basis isn't recommended on stock brakes of any sort. A good friend of mine who owns a 2013 GT500 recently upgraded his brakes because of the same issue. He has hit 200mph though.


Don't underestimate your safety and the safety of your passengers.

So if anyone has suggestions on what to replace this stuff with I'm all ears. My budget is $500 after shipping to my APO.

 

[evanjp]

My rear rotors have those weird lines on them. They also make a bit of noise.

 

[el jefe 302]

Those lines tell me you were at a full stop with hot pads with your foot on the brake and they were just cooking into the rotor.

Thats how those lines get burned in, which causes warped rotors since your super heating one spot of the rotor.

 

[Mark Aubele]

No need for slotted rotors either, but most certainly not drilled.

 

[mjohns930]

Is that grease on the rotor hat? Are you losing a wheel bearing?

 

[twistedneck]

Those are smoked! time for a set of hawk HPS. http://www.hawkperformance.com/performance-street/pads/high-performance-street

those worked wonders on my pal's GTO. we burned through pads with spirited highway driving and finally put the Hawk pads on. All overheats and stink gone, more stopping power and no noise.

 

[Stevedotmil]

That's not grease on the rotor hat. That's brake dust build up. I'm ordering a set of slotted Stoptech rotors and some Hawk HPS pads. I am debating on if I should change the fluid as well. It's been 3 years on the same fluid as well. I'm going to change it all out to ATE Super Blue Race fluid. I can get it relatively cheap here in Germany. I have been really "driving" my car lately and it's time for a Driver Mod. Too much braking because I wasn't confident in my driving abilities to control the car. Instead I mashed the brakes which caused them to overheat.

This just kind of sucks because i'm trying to sell my car here in Germany. I'm retiring from the army after 21 years of service so I am trying to cut back on all the "want" expenses and focus more on the need stuff. If my car doesn't sell before I get out I'm going to have new improved brakes I guess.

 

[mavisky]

As mentioned before the lines are from getting the brakes hot and then sitting still. Even if you just pull off the track and park it, the pads being that close to the rotor will keep that section from cooling as well as the rest of the rotor. This creates warping and the lines you see. It's important to save a lap or two for cool down before pulling into the pits to keep this from happening.

 

[Stevedotmil]

This wasn't from track driving. This was from driving on a curvy country road in Germany where the speed limit is 60mph. I get what you are saying though. I have been giving them a 15-20 minute cool down cruise after having some fun after that since then. Although I haven't been driving that road or putting myself in situations where I would have to mash the brakes since I have been having problems.

Here's the road.

http://youtu.be/pjcKlKHZ2uM

 

[mavisky]

That road should put some heat in them, but 15-20 minutes of cool down should be enough to clean them up.

I was pushing my 4,000 LB pig through much more strenuous roads with the 4 piston brembo's and autozone ceramic pads with no problems the other weekend.

 

[Mark Aubele]

I would rather run the factory pads than Hawk HPS. Completely unsuitable for "spirited" driving.

 

[Budwise]

After running that hard dont engage the ebrake or sit with the brakes on.

 

[TheVikingRL]

I would rather run the factory pads than Hawk HPS. Completely unsuitable for "spirited" driving.

+1. I wouldn't expect HPS to be an upgrade over the factory Brembo pads.

 

[Stevedotmil]

What pads would be more performance than stock if not the HPS pads? I was thinking the HP + pads or the new 5.0 street pads. I don't have any experience with aftermarket pads so I am asking for advice from those of you who have used them. I don't care about brake dust, just performance. I thought about some DTC-60 pads as well since they have a temp range that starts at 200 degrees but goes up to 1400 I think.

 

[twistedneck]

+1. I wouldn't expect HPS to be an upgrade over the factory Brembo pads.

The Brembo pads are Akibono not Brembo. and I can tell you they are lower temp range than Hawk HPS. They both bite fine but cold the HPS has less bit usually meaning its a slightly more robust pad.

 

[Mark Aubele]

What pads would be more performance than stock if not the HPS pads? I was thinking the HP + pads or the new 5.0 street pads. I don't have any experience with aftermarket pads so I am asking for advice from those of you who have used them. I don't care about brake dust, just performance. I thought about some DTC-60 pads as well since they have a temp range that starts at 200 degrees but goes up to 1400 I think.

DTC-60s are probably a bit too aggressive for the street (take a bit to get heat in them), the HP+ is decent for street and light track use, but they are noisy and dust a TON. The Ferodo DS2500 is a good dual use pad too.

Haven't had my '14 on track yet but the factory Track Pack/Boss pads seem OK for autocross and street use so far. Will likely go with the Ferodo myself for autocross and hillclimb, possibly DTC-60.

 

[Stevedotmil]

Thanks for the replies. I really am leaning towards the HP+ or the DCT-60. The F2500 pads some of my friends use so maybe that route too. I don't care about dust or noise...because racecar. I care about stopping when I need to from a high speed. When a VW Polo slides into the left lane when I'm cruising down the autobahn at 120-130MPH and I need to slow down then that's when I need them to work quickly.

I will be putting my Pirellis back on in April before I make my first trip to the Nürburgring and I will get plenty of use out of them there as well.

 

[Stevedotmil]

So it looks like I'm going to order the Centri blank rotors that Vorshlag runs on their track cars. They are cheap and I don't care about bling. I am trying to find the best stuff I can get without breaking the bank. I will be using the HP Plus pads from Hawk as well. I will post pictures of everything including the install when the new stuff gets here. Thanks for everyone's help and opinions on this stuff. Hopefully it will help someone else in the future.

 

[twistedneck]

So it looks like I'm going to order the Centri blank rotors that Vorshlag runs on their track cars. They are cheap and I don't care about bling. I am trying to find the best stuff I can get without breaking the bank. I will be using the HP Plus pads from Hawk as well. I will post pictures of everything including the install when the new stuff gets here. Thanks for everyone's help and opinions on this stuff. Hopefully it will help someone else in the future.

I went with the floating pads from Gyrodisc stock 32mm width to go with the Brembo calipers.. These are great rotors and any good fixed rotor will work well too however you are paying a price for the non floating rotor - brake knock back and not just the intermittent type. free floating helps that a lot.

the main issues with brake complaints with the old GT500's was knock back feeling like fade not actual knock back. yea, that car and the new one are hard to fit brake duct cooling in stock so it did fade a little but the old school s197 flexy spindle eats bearings and causes the rotor to flex a ton moving the pads around and wearing unevenly. Vorshlag stocks those in their trailer and race teams have them pre -built so its easy to swap. new gt350 is so much stiffer in that area.. so the perceived fade and that extra wear will be gone. I also heard the taller 6 piston calipers make it worse by wrapping all the way to the top or bottom of the rotor causing extra deflection, so on a car like s197 don't use those big calipers unless you get the race ones.

that's why our calipers are installed on the back of the rotor not the top or bottom, it deflects less in that area! old school setups on top make the problem much worse but still its there even with fully floating calipers unless you get a race caliper that shoves the pads against the rotors slightly at all times.

only thing we can do is float the rotor and don't use overly wide front tires. the new s550 gt350 can handle 305's in front the s197 can't.

 

[Stevedotmil]

Thanks for the information. I got a deal on some stock rotors locally from a guy. I'm going to install pads too when I get around to ordering them. If the guy that I got them from has a set of stock pads he said he would give them to me. I would buy some entry level race pads like the DTC-60 and swap them out when I plan on having some fun.