Brake issues at Tremblant.

[TroyV]

My track miles were in the 250 mile range. I burned through two full sets of HT-10's in front. For a clear picture, The car is a full weight 03 cobra. I have ducts installed, and I'm using 2000 Cobra R Brembos on solid Brembo blank rotors from Tirerack. There are four track days on the rotors including the days at Tremblant. I ran both days on one set of 5 cycle V710's.. The tires saw significantly less wear than I anticipated.

I was driving pretty hard, but I think I still am burning through brake pads WAY too fast.... the rotors are pretty much finished as well. I don't feel as though I was riding the brakes much at all this time, but I was seeing two major brake zones in relatively close proximity.. (the braking zone into 8, and then into 10.

In order to stick with the less costly 17" tires, I plan to stay with the Brembo kit and not go with a larger caliper, such as the Stoptech.

So my question is, what options do I have to extend brake pad and rotor wear? I'm not looking for a miracle, I know these are wear items... Here are what I think are my options:

Lighter wheels....like SSR Comps perhaps. I can try different pads. I can try different rotors. Are there any other ideas I'm missing? I can remove some weight, but all the easy stuff has been removed besides the back seat. I'd like to keep that as this is still a street car.

I felt much better about my driving after this event than last year, though I still feel somewhat ham fisted tooling around that course.

[zip4zat]

Troy,
I think your first step should be to go to a higher temp rated pad. If you want to stick to hawks, at least go to the ht14s, but the dtc-70 would be a way better pad for such a heavy car. PFC 97/01 would also hold up better than the ht-10s.

Other things, better cooling, better venting in the rotors.. if youre going thru rotors that fast and they're cheap you might as well just consider them consumable at the same rate as pads.

MT is fairly heavy on braking 4, 8, 10, 14 and some good braking just before some of those turns. Its heavier than many other tracks that we run. Plus on top of that it was pretty hot out over the 2 days too. Hope this points you in a better direction

[TroyV]

Tirerack sells the Brembo blanks for something like 65 bucks a pop.. I would definitely treat them as a consumable at that price. I had a mustang guy on one of the other message forums suggest the PFC 01's as well.

Thanks for the advice Joe.

[DanDarcy]

Troy ;
I run a heavy Mustang and also have the Brembo brakes from the 2000 R I was going through the stock Brembo pads every other event and I don't due the far away events where you can put on a lot of miles. After about 700 miles (both street and track equal) the right front rotor sheared off at the "hat" . Brembo had 13 such cases when mine did it at Watkins Glen at about 145 into the Bus Stop. Upon inspection , the left front rotor was all cracked and ready to shear off. Cracks only visible from the back side. Brembo says the wheel bearings and spindles flex too much causing the heavy cast rotor to crack, Ford says the rotors are a weak casting. Brembo sent me a new set of rotors n/c. I installed a set of DBA (disc brake Australia) rotors and went to hawk Blues (they are painted blue also) . I ran the whole 2006 season with no rotor wear and one set of pads. Thats 3 NHIS events, 1 LRP event, and 2 Watkins Glen events (Audi Club). I am very hard on brakes and my car weights 3740# with 1/2 tank of fuel and no driver. The DBA rotors are slotted like the Brembos and have temperature sensors that tell you what temp they reached. I do not have brake cooling ducts but the DBA rotors and Hawk Blue pads work very well for me.

[grovefromnh]

Along with ducting cool air to the brakes, it's important to reject hot air as well. Removing the shetmetal plates behind the rotors will help a lot. When changing the rotors,remove the plates or cut off the back half and bend the front half outward to grab some air.

[offcamber09]

Troy, I've used the HT14s and Brembo slotted rotors for a couple of years now- and I can easily get a season (6 or 7 events) on 1 set of rotors and almost a season on the pads. Yes my car(s) weigh 600# less. I agree with Grove on the backing plate removal- get the brake hoses as close as possible to the center of the rotors. You won't have any problem driving on the street without the backing plates. DO NOT use the HT14 pads on the street, though, you will eat up rotors very fast.

[cuda6666]

I run DBA slotted rotors with Carbotech XP10 pads. I change out both pads and rotors before and after each event

This setup works great, and I've been on one set for only the 3 events Ive run so far this year (minimal track miles, of course ) But when I got back from MT, I noticed surface heat cracking on the rotors. Some of the cracks are big enough to feel with my fingernail. I'm sending pictures to the vendor (brakeswap.com) and am wondering what I did wrong and what my options are. I always take an easy lap at the end of a session, but didn't drive around the paddock at MT like I always do at NHIS. Could insufficient cooldown be the problem?

Does it make sense to turn the rotors until the cracks are gone
How bad do they have to look before one shatters going into 3 at NHIS

I never had this kind of a problem with the Cuda!

[TroyV]

Thanks for the tips guys. I actually have ducts installed, and the backsplash plate was removed to make room for the duct plate. I'll check out the DBA rotors.. I have heard some good things about them. Cuda, heat checking on the surface of the rotor is normal, as long as the cracks are not very large, say longer than .25 or .375 in length, it is not much of an issue.....it's just something to keep an eye on.

[ctkag]

I was running the DBA 2-piece rotors for a while but found the availability of new discs to be a problem. I don't know if the situation is any better now. The one-piece rotors seem readily available.

I switched back to stock Subaru rotors and just treated them as consumeables - replaced them after every couple of events. I did crack three rotors at one event at LRP a few years back.

I switched to Stoptechs three years ago and 90% of my braking issues have gone away. I found that I did burn through a lot of pad at MT - the three high speed braking zones (4,8 & 10) seem to use them up. No brake cooling issues.

[brucesallen]

Best solution: Don't use the brakes so much. Go faster into the corners- aspecially those that are properly "fast-in-slow-out" like turn 8 (carousel) and 10 (at the end of the back straight) at Mt.Tremblant.
Brake will only slow you down.

[TroyV]

This coming from the guy with the 35 pound car.

[grovefromnh]

If all else fails you can always watercool the front rotors. Get a large windshield washer tank and wiper mounted squirter nozzels from a junkyard. Mount the squirters to the front suspension so that it squirts into the center space of the vented rotor. Wire the pump to the brake light switch with an off/on toggle switch on the dash. As brakes get really hot on the practice sessions, switch on the pump after a couple of laps as the rotors need to be at an optimum temp. This worked great on my SPA Camaro.

[cuda6666]

If all else fails you can always watercool the front rotors.

But that wouldn't be legal in ST because it's not specifically called out in the rule book, right?

[chaos4NH]

If all else fails you can always watercool the front rotors.

But that wouldn't be legal in ST because it's not specifically called out in the rule book, right?

Of course that second motor mounted in your trunk can't be legal for ST either!! Great time at Tremblant, you old sand bagger!!

[cuda6666]

Thanks Sam,

Yeah, I turned in a 2:04 for staging because my timer didn't show up for the practice sessions, and my best time last year was a 2:07. I think I have to give credit to Bruce for much of the improvement this year. In addition to his advice to "just drive faster", he helped me dial in the rebound on my new coilovers so I didn't feel like I was about to crash in every corner.