Has anyone ever measured the improvement from brake upgrades ?

[muddyboots]

Just wondered if anyone had actually measured the improvements given by various braking upgrades.

While I've done a couple of 312mm conversions myself and can feel an obvious difference, I wondered if anyone has ever done any testing on stopping distance improvements etc ??

 

[UncleFester]

288mm discs and stock pads - by the 2nd heavy stop from 80mph i had severe fade

288mm discs and ebc red pads - 3rd heavy stop from 80 fade AND wobble

312mm discs and ebc red pads - 3rd heavy stop from 80 fade, wobble and solid pedal

312mm discs and DS2500 4 pot Porsche calipers - as many roundabouts as i like braking from 80+ with no fade, no wobble and no solid pedal

 

[Willie]

That says it all

 

[RobDon]

I went from stock brakes to 4-pot Brembos to 6-pot Tarox and felt quite a difference each time. The Brembos were good round Knockhill with repeated hard braking and no fade, but the 6-pots are just awesome, car feels like it's gonna stand on its nose when you brake hard!

 

[muddyboots]

I understand what you're all saying - you can feel the difference.

Wondered if anyone has measured the actual reduction in stopping distances though....

 

[UncleFester]

Well techincally by the 3rd or 4th application under heavy braking i had no brakes at all using the 312mm discs and ebc reds - all that was left to slow the car was gears and faith in the tyres. Despite substantially more abuse, i've yet to experience that on the new stuff.

I see your point thoughl, have my normal braking distances come down yesbecause now i know i can brake later and harder for longer with complete faith that i'll be able to stop if required. The problem with measuring that is that i'm unable to hold the tape measure on the road whilst driving Before i changed the brakes, i didn't bother to take notice of any brake point landmarks.

 

[goble]

I understand what you're all saying - you can feel the difference.

Wondered if anyone has measured the actual reduction in stopping distances though....

quite hard to do as you'd have to know exactly what force is going to be applied eachtime to the pedal ,fluid temp,pad temp,disc temp,tyre temp,surface temp, on what type of surface quality of surface, and a choice of probably 10-20 differet types of tyre/compound,size of master cylinder etc etc etc etc etc etc

 

[ibizacupra]

its not just stopping distances but also heat dissipation vs usage......
if you can lock your wheels at any speed then thats your limit surely. if you can do it from repeated high speed stops tho............... heat hot fade, boiling brakes............. bigger dissipates the heat better, 2-piece disks also.. for same size deal with high temps a lot better. not always just size related (ohh errr missus)

 

[muddyboots]

Yeah, I realise it's not just about stopping distances but ability to withstand repeated braking.

But for general road use, just be interesting to know how much you could knock off the typical braking distances.
What Car and other magazines do braking distance tests from 70mph etc, wonder how many metres you could shave off by - say - doing a 312mm upgrade on an Ibiza. I know you feel much more bite with this upgrade - you can really feel the front of the car diving right down - but does this actually make a big difference to stopping distances ?

I'm suprised none of the uprated pad companies haven't done tests like this, you'd have thought it would be good advertising and make performance brake upgrades appeal to a larger customer base (ie not just enthusiasts).
Or maybe they have and I've just never seen them....

 

[Willie]

Aye your quite right, safety sells and all that
And as you said performance sell to enthusiasts aswell
Dare say we could get somethiung together
We could get guys with different set ups do repeated stops from 75 MPH (speedo reading)
I'd be willing to do this with my motor, just finding a suitable dry surface would be a problem

 

[muddyboots]

Nice idea but to give any meaningful results it would mean testing lots of different pad / disk combinations on the exact same car, same weather conditions, same temperature, same tyres/pressures, same suspension, same driver etc etc etc otherwise there are too many variables. Plus you'd need some exact timing/measuring equipment.

One thing that did spring to mind, was whether vag-com can extract g-force readings from ESP sensors ? Coupled with measuring wheel speed over time this might provide some useful info. But again it would all have to be done under controlled conditions.

 

[jonjay]

The standard 288mm discs and OE pads suffered from fade after two three purposeful stops. I am sure getting good pads would have helped but opted for a ATE Powerdiscs 312mm disc and ds2500 pads. I have yet to suffer any real fade from them after some abuse on country roads on the way to a Rolling Road with 13 other seats

Yet to see how well they fair on a track day and if they are upto it...i am afraid I probably never will because a big brake conversion is on the horizon start of next year.