maybe the weather, but it seems very strange for this to be 'normal' practise

Black ice?

But surely if it were black ice it would skid?

I have had this happen as well, very scary :eek:

I remember I came across it soon after I had bought the car and they had started salting the roads. During the summer, it has NEVER happened even when it's been soaking wet. A couple of days ago, it happened again, yep they are salting again and it was wet, so there seems to be a connection there.

Pumping the brakes hard a couple of times brings them back to normal, so I wonder if it is more a salt layer that had built up on the discs??

Don't know if this is right exactly, but did Audi suffer badly from the same effect when it was wet and the roads were salted?

IMO it is also down to the feel of the pedal I find it very soft and prefer the feel of our mondeo and my mum's chevy which are both very hard and you need to give them a good jab..... This is probably from leaning to drive in an original mini where your stopping distance was directly related to how strong your leg was!

I noticed exactly the same effect with the standard Octy RS braking set-up. Most notably on the way back from the (very wet) Duxford meet at the end of 2003. There were at least 2 occasions when the car felt like it didn't want to stop.

Since fitting DS2500's all round it has never re-occurred even from cold, or in the worst of downpours.

Personal opinion - Standard pads are poor.

The front discs are vented, maybe grooved disks would help clear the water from the disc surface?

D'oh I did mean grooved

Quite often i find myself giving the brakes a good prod before i even get to a corner as it almost feels like you need to get some heat into the suckers, and i like knowing what im going to get before i really need them.

I realise this isnt possible on most roads however, and if there is any traffic behind you (unless you want a Montoya vs Shumacher in monaco style incident!)

But anyway, surely this is pretty unaceptable if temperature is to blame, the coldest i have seen so far is only -1.5 degrees.

My girlfriend is Canadian and last time i was there it was -38 degrees c :eek: on the coldest day of my visit and noone was driving around desparately stabbing there brakes all the time.

Maybe if skoda uk look at these forums all the time, they could give us some advice??

Paul - I have had the same sort of feeling a couple of times in the last few days with my Octy. I definitely put it down to the wet / cold & snow together putting something between the pads and disks - particularly given that i've never had any problems with them before in wet conditions.

Just been thinking, and maybe the canada comparison is unfair...although it was minus 38 which is bloomin cold, it was dry at the time...so maybe it is more of about water/salt being on the disks. :confused:

just missed by what kim tells me was a few inches.

Isn't this relevant to a thread in The Lounge?

Chris

With regards to Pbirkett and his brake issues

I have had the same problems with my Furby and it

was a very unerving experience to say the least. :eek:

Twice now on the same road and in the same place I have had total brake loss!!. Once with less than 100 miles on the clock and again with 5000.

On a downhill left hand and very bumpy bit of road I have hit the brakes hard

and no brakes!! Just a heavy vibration through the steering and a pulling to the right. Road conditions were perfect. Sunny and dry.

Both times I have pulled up and got underneath to check everything was ok.

I had the car up and the wheels off just to check the wheel nuts were on solid and the front calipers were still bolted on secure.

And a couple of other times coming off motorway slip roads breaking firmly,Initial braking responce was ok and then nothing. Oh my god am I gonna stop!!.

Pbirkett expieriences make me think there is an issue. Is there??