SteveA

iTrader: (1)

This is long...don't read it if you aren't interested!

I know there are thousands of threads on brakes and BBK's. I think I've read most of them in the last few months, but still aren't sure what to do next. I would like to hear from the track racers (the serious ones!), from your experience what will give me the brake results I am looking for. I'm not interested in a Stoptech vs AP racing vs Rotora semantic debate either. I'll use washing machine parts if they work

This is my situation. I daily drive my 06 350Z but like to track it as often as possible. In fact that's what I bought it for, a daily driver that could still have serious fun at the track without buying a race car. I couldn't afford a Porsche GT3 RS. There are probably better track cars for the money than the 350Z, but I am a sentimental Zed ownere for the last 25 years.

I drive hard at the track. I've done club racing in different cars and open wheel racing over the years, and despite it's limitations I think the stock Zed is a pretty decent track drive...except for the @#%* brakes which are crap in my opinion. I think I could even be quicker than a few of those GT3 drivers (the bad ones, anyway ) if the brakes would last more than three laps.

I have the factory Brembos, steel braided lines, front cooling ducts and use RBF600 Motul. I'm currently using Hawk HP+ pads on the street and PFC01Front/PFC97 rear combo on the track. I use the stock wheels on the road and ROTA 18x9.5's fitted with 275/35 Nitto Nt01's at the track. Apart from that the car is stock for now.

Despite some minor improvements from the mods I have made, the Brembos are fried, and heat fade gets me every time. I also hate the mushy, long travel feel of the stock pedal, even with constant brake bleeding.

I simply want a hard pedal that I can modulate with pressure rather than travel and zero heat fade over a 30 minute track session even if it's 100 degrees + outside and I have the red mist.

I have thought about the next small step forward being replacing the stock rotors for two piece which might hold more heat, but that won't cure the pedal feel issue, so I guess I will have to spend money on the BBK. ( I hate spending money unless it gets results, and have zero interest in bling factor..)

But do I really need a 4 wheel kit or will a front upgrade get me what I want? Maybe a front upgrade and better rotors on the stock rear? And what about optimising brake bias?

If anyone out there is enjoying track day braking Nirvana in their 350Z, without having spent more than a few thousand bucks, even if you don't have multi colored calipers from a name brand BBK supplier ( All my calipers end up black anyway ), I would love to hear your comments and recommendations.

ripdrift

I have been using brembos that I upgraded with ss lines sloted and vained rotors, 2p on the front, rbf600 fluid and stillen street/track pads for the passed month. They worked well for about 3 laps but then started to fade. The pads were killed at cal speedway (roval) 2 weeks ago coming around the oval into the infield at about 150 for a hole day. Brakes got mushy, over heated and then started to grind my rotors. I have since moved on to a different pad, Endless type cc-r and the difference is like night and day. No fade or over heating. Put this set up to the test at reno-fernly speedway in navada where the track was pretty hot, the temp was in the 90s and the brakes never failed. My stoping power increased, and I could go deeper into the brakeing zone then before. Plus the pedal stayed firm through all 5, 30 min sessions and one 45 min session. The brembos work on the track, but there are better brakes out there you just have to upgrade everything. My car however is striped of everything and and is tracked every weeked almost so they might be less sufficiant if you have a street car that you ocassionally track because I wouldn't run race compound pads on the street.

Todd TCE

iTrader: (1)

You've got three issues here:

1. Questionable pad choices and mixes.
2. Heat saturation.
3. Feel and feedback.

I say questionable as moving from PF to Hawk and back can cause you some issues. The PF pads tend to put down a lot of carbon and casue the Hawks to smear when used. This in turn may lead to the return to PF pads not being as effective as you'd like. Here I'd suggest you consider some fresh or turned rotors with your HP+ pads and see if you can sourse some Hawks such as HT10 or such that can swap for the track. Speak to a Hawk (Ferrocarboon) rep and explain your needs.

The heat issue is simply not going away without a rotor change. Mass is mass and you are limited at this time. I'd consider some air ducts for this if possible and properly place them at hub center. Going two piece can help a bit by taking weight out and going DV on the rotor where higher speeds for the track use can benefit from it.

Pedal feel can be related to a couple of things; balance of displacements, boiled fluid and boundary layer build up on the pads. Assuming no boil it comes to the others. Pads build up a gaseous layer. Slotted rotors can help that as can slotted pads. Running the wrong pad can lead to quicker build up of this so back to pads again? Lastly the balance of displacement from Master to caliper is (as you suspect) the most likely reason for your softer pedal feel. Mfgs don't want you to need to push hard on the pedal- that's not right for the masses...but your desires are spot on. You might look to a larger bore MC for your desired result. Moving to a bigger bore means firmer pedal with no change to front to rear bias etc. From the other end if you put calipers on with less piston area you get the same resultant feel. Caution however as doing so in a mis matched form can lead to greater bias inbalance.

Is the BBK the answer? Probably but I'd certainly try to exploit what you can first if on a limited budget. The BBK addresses all those issues by providing a greater level of efficeiency. More rotor mass, directional, good pads and smaller displacement piston areas.

SteveA

iTrader: (1)

I already have ducts running directly into the dust shields as close to the hub centres as the limited access allows. They have improved things some.

Pad choice is tough. I have tried a lot of different pad combinations. The PFC pads are the best I have tried so far, but I haven't tried HT10's yet. Or the Endless pads mentioned by Ripdrift.

I was working on the principal that driving to the track cold with the PFC pads would clean up the disks on the way, removing the road pad deposit. Maybe I should use a less aggresive street pad? Possibly HP+ is not the best road pad to be using and is actually less important to me. I was using Axxis Ultimates on the road which were also fine, but they wore out and I had the HP+s spare.

It seems to me the Brembo calipers are big enough to provide plenty of stopping power which is what bugs me about spending money on replacement calipers in a BBK. Good point about a bigger master cylinder, this is something I think is worth investigating to improve pedal feel on the stock set up. Maybe a bigger master with 2 piece rotors might do the job...

Thanks for the comments.