I cant remember mate, iirc i bought 3 bottles of fluid so 1.5 litres sounds about right.

RBF600 is half the price of RBF660 and Castrol SRF so you can see why i choose it over the other two which i found to show no gain in the braking use i subjected them too. Maybe if your actually racing a car, but not needed for trackdays

I have found this info on a different forum, the last paragraph is particularly interesting with regards to the size of your brakes in combination to your engine.

Heres all the brake sizes on the VAG range, and what they are fitted to as standard.

VW Golf R32 | Audi TT 3.2 Quattro

• The Front brakes are 334mm x 32mm Vented 2-piece Discs, Twin piston(32mm/42mm) calipers
  

• The Rear brakes are 256mm x 22mm Vented Discs, 38mm Lucas singles
  Seat Leon Cupra R
  The Front brakes are 323mm x 28mm Vented (grooved/drilled option) discs with 4 piston(34/38mm) Brembo calipers
  The rear brakes are 256mm x 22mm Vented , with 38m Lucas single piston calipers
  Audi TT-Quattro (225hp) | VW Golf anniversary | Golf GTI AUQ | Skodá Octavia VRS | VW Golf V5 170 | VW Golf V6 4 Motion
  
• The Front brakes are 312mm x 25mm Vented Discs, 54mm ATE single piston calipers
  
• The Rear brakes are 256mm x 22mm Vented Discs, 38mm Lucas single Piston calipers
  Audi TT (180hp)
  
• The Front brakes are 312mm x 25mm Vented Discs, 54mm ATE single piston calipers
  
• The Rear brakes are 232mm x 9mm Solid Discs,
  Golf GTI 1.8T | Golf 130/150 TDI | Golf V5 150 | Seat Leon 130/150 TDI and 20VT
  
• The Front brakes are 288mm x 25mm Vented Discs, 54mm ATE single piston calipers
  
• The Rear brakes are 232mm x 9mm Solid Discs
  Golf 2.0 8v | 1.8 | TDI 115 | TDI 110 | TDI 100 | TDI 90
  
• The Front brakes are 280mm x 22mm Vented Discs, Single piston calipers, caliper carrier integrated into hub (FS III's)
  
• The Rear brakes are 232mm x 9mm Solid discs
  
• Golf 1.4 16V | Golf 1.6 16v | Golf 1.6 8v | SDI
  
• The Front brakes are 256mm x 22mm Vented Discs, single piston calipers, carriers integrated into hub (FS III's)
  
• The Rear brakes are 232mm x 9mm Solid Discs
  
• BRAKE DISC INFO
  
• Heat capacity
  
• Heat capacity is the amount of energy that can be absorbed by the disc before the temperature gets high enough to cause brake fade. The mass of the disc is proportional to the heat capacity. Therefore, a lighter disc will not allow as much energy to be absorbed as a heavy disc.
  Solid vs Vented
  
• Vented discs are hollow with internal vanes. This increases the surface area of the disc and allows air to cool the disc mass more effectively. A 5Kg vented disc will cool much quicker than a 5Kg solid disc. In many cases, a vented disc can weigh less than a solid disc and still provide more effective braking because of the cooling effects alone.
  Curved vs straight vanes
  
• The vanes inside vented discs provide structural integrity to the disc itself as well as cooling. There are several different styles of vanes:
  
• Straight vanes are the most common because they are easy to manufacture.
  
• Curved vanes are common in higher performance cars as they promote better cooling better than straight vanes.
  Where does the air go?
  
• For solid discs, all the air travels over the surface of the disc - the same surface as the brake pads.
  
• For vented discs, a considerable amount of air flows through the interior. Because it's spinning so fast, it creates a vacuum and air is sucked into the center of the disc and forced out through the edges. The air follows the pattern of the internal vanes.
  Drilled discs
  
• A common misconception is that the purpose of drilled discs is to promote cooling. This couldn't be further from the truth, The real purpose is to reduce weight.
  
• Drilling can allow brake dust and gases to escape, but with modern brake pads, this usually isn't a problem. Choosing a drilled disc for that purpose doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
  
• Many high performance cars like Porsche and Mercedes AMG come with drilled discs from the factory. For these cars, the drilling is mainly about the looks, just like bright red calipers. When people do serious high-performance driving on a trackdays, they usually swap to regular plain discs.
  
• Drilled discs generally wear out brake pads faster and produce much more brake dust as a result.
  
• Drilled discs have a shorter service-life than plain discs and tend to develop stress fissures/cracks over their lifetime
  Grooved Discs
  
• Grooved discs keep the pad surface clean and allow certain gasses to escape which improves performance. not too many grooves though, you only need 6 or so, anymore and it it just for looks(e.g tarox cheese graters)
  
• For street driving they may make a marginal improvement in initial brake "bite"
  
• Grooved Discs are great for shedding water and mud off the rotor surface as in Rally racing or wet-weather racing.
  
• Grooved Discs do accelerate pad wear and produce more dust just like drilled discs do. They also add noise and vibration into the system. For many these issues are annoying enough to not choose grooved discs, unless you do alot of rallying!
  Two-piece discs
  
• Two piece discs have several advantages including lower weight while maintaining most of the heat capacity and better cooling by having a more open center section
  
• Two piece discs increase costs and generally a poor choice for street cars. For racing, they are great!
  Plain discs
  
• Plain discs are the best choice for 99.9% of applications
  Name brand vs non-name discs
  
• Why pay double the money for a Brembo discs vs. GSF cheapo's? You guessed it there is pretty much no benefit. Its all the same stuff, Spend you money on brake pads
  Specialist Discs (carbon, carbon-ceramic, carbon-kevlar, etc.)
  
• Some really expensive cars come with an option for fancy brake materials. These brakes are excellent for trackdays since they are relatively lightweight but can withstand extreme temperatures without brake fade. This provides a competitive advantage for racing.
  
• For the street, it doesn't help much at all, and they squeal alot and wear fast.
  Warped discs
  
• if your discs are warped its because you have heated them up too much during hard breaking. probably nackered but you might be able to get them skimmed.
  
• BRAIDED BRAKE LINES
  
• Braided Brake hoses
  
• Braided brake lines don't expand or bulge out, therefore reduce pedal travel, and increase the force applied to the brakes. I have never tried braided lines before, I think they don't really do alot on modern cars (especially the golf) because the servo makes the pedal feel soft anyway. It is a FACT that they apply more power to the caliper, but the caliper can easily apply twice the amount of pressure to the discs than the tyres are capable of handling anyway, i mean unless you have a track car with wide slick tyres, these are not really necessary.
  
• BRAKE FLUID
  
• If you want to improve your braking power on a budget, try using a Performance brand of Brake fluid and bleed your brakes. it makes alot of difference!
  
• Chances are your fluid now is old and has absorbed some water and air and is not as good as it should be so the pedal will feel spongy. Sort this by bleeding your brakes and use a decent brand of fluid, ATE Super Blue Racing sounds good, and it's blue! how cool is that! anyway, it does make it easier to see when the new fluid has come through, and it has a low viscosity, it resistant to absorbing water, and has a boiling point of 200°C, which means less brake fade. another one is Castrol SPF Racing, it's expensive though!
  
• BRAKE PADS
  
• There's lots of different types of these on the market, EBC, Mintex, Tarox, Pagid, Black Diamond, Brembo to name a few.
  
• They are just made better, and depending on what you go for, they will provide better braking power / low dust etc..
  
• They come in different levels of agressiveness, for example the EBC range is as follows:
  
• EBC Blackstuff - Standard use
  
• EBC Greenstuff - Street
  
• EBC Redstuff - Fast Street
  
• EBC Yellowstuff - Track
  
• EBC Bluestuff - Race
  
• if you go for the "race"option be prepared to get more dust, squealing/vibrations and accellerated pad wear and a harsh feel to the brakes - unsuitable for normal driving so thats why theres a range.
  
• buying performance brake pads will make a difference to your braking power, for not alot extra cash over the standard pads.
  
• BRAKE BIAS
  
• Ever wondered why the front brakes are always bigger? By design most original factory brake systems do not split the brake force 50/50 between the front and rear axles. This is because under braking the front tires offer increased traction as weight is transferred forward. This additional traction can be utilized by increasing the brake force applied to the front axle vs. the rear. The outcome is a bias split that is more in the order of 70 front/30 rear resulting in shorter and more controlled stops.
  
• BIGGER IS NOT ALWAYS BETTER........
  
• Putting bigger brakes on may not always be a good idea.
  
• For chipped/re-mapped cars the obvious upgrade is 312mm fronts because it's so easy, and only requires carriers and discs for most models(not SDI, TDI 90, 100, 110, 115, 2.0 8v, 1.6 8v, 1.6 16v, 1.4 16v,).and because you have increased the power of the engine, the power to wheel will not be de-creased as it would if you just put bigger brakes on.
  
• But, putting the 312mm conversion on a 1.4 for example, along with bigger wheels than standard and you will be adding alot of weight to your wheels, and the engine will be put under more strain, therefore reducing your accelleration. and Big brakes, contrary to popular beleif, don't actually do as much as people think in terms of stopping power increase, it's mainly that the disc heats up less, cools faster and therefore can stop the car more effectively, corner after corner without getting brake fade. IMO, the best brake mod for the smaller engined cars would be Performance pads and Performance Brake fluid, I wouldn't bother with drilled and grooved discs they just make your wallet lighter.
  

Pretty much exactly as i have been saying.

the last paragraph is particularly interesting with regards to the size of your brakes in combination to your engine.

But what output 1.4 are they talking of? Bear in mind we have a higher power to weight output than a 2.0T Golf GTI (which runs 312mm as standard), so adding bigger brakes wont effect the vRS as much as what it would a normally aspirated 1.4 or a low 1.4TSI 122ps engine fr example.

They are also talking of adding bigger heavier wheels in that parahgraph as well. The 17" rims will take take 345mm disc with ease and space to spare. I know of guys running 360mm discs on 17" rims so there is no need to go for larger alloys either.

FWIW, my Tarox 6 pots with 323mm discs weigh 1kg less per side than the standard single piston 288mm setup!! If i was to have 2 piece discs instead of single piece cast setup my kit would be around 5kg per side lighter than stock!

As my sig says, every day is a learning day I will have to make a few calls tomorrow and see what I can source for the Fabia, if I can get something that will fit the Golf too I have a win win. Thanks for all your advice so far vRSy.

When the car is in next I'll buy some RBF600 and ask them to change it. That could be all I need.

When the car is in next I'll buy some RBF600 and ask them to change it. That could be all I need.

This is my fix this week as my brakes have gone bad after Combe, I will change the fluid then see if I can drop on some brake calipers etc.

Mine were a bit spongy for a few miles but fine this morning.

Good advice in that long quote, very nice find. It's funny how much flame I got here some time ago when I wrote that bigger brakes do nothing to your stopping distances but are better in heat management .

I will buy that Motul fluid but will leave the pads to see how they fare on the track.

Oh, one thing about grooved discs, they prevent pads glaze as well.

Best off doing annual fluid changes with RBF600 as well or even more if you track the car often

I am not doing grooved discs, just muller the standard ones on the car, when they wear down, standard ones will go back on, I know from last time the Yellow stuff pads made a real impression on the discs at Oulton Park, do grooves increase surface area and therefore braking efficiency :think:

The pads ate the discs and left a full pattern of grooves in a radial pattern, they are still on and work ok.

The difference between Dot 4 and Dot 5.1 fluids is not related to performance but instead the type of fluid. Dot 4 is glycol based and dot 5.1 is silicone based. You need to be comparing Wet and Dry boiling temperatures. The higher the better. With Super DOT4 look for the ones with the highr wet boiling temperatures IMO. DOT4 fluids absorb water over time, so the higher the boiling temp(they quote for 3% water content)

Not true. Dot 5.1 are not Silicone based, but along with some Super dot 4's are Synthetic based. It is Dot 5 that is Silicone based and can't be mixed with other fluids. I have also read that Dot 5 fluid can't be used with ABS too. Dot 5.1 can be mixed with Dot,3,4 and Super 4.

If you want to buy fluid, then our Sponsor, Opie Oils is another good place.

The grooves help stop the pads from glazing , they are an improvement over solid discs

http://www.apracing.com/products/race_car/formula_student/sae/brake_discs.aspx

my brakes were 50,000 miles old! lol.... still work :thumbup:

I just have to decide if the benefits overall are worth it. It's not often I drive more than 8/10ths or do track days and it's only then it shows up. The brakes work fine just fade. I'll do a fluid change to one of the better ones come the next service (4000 miles time).

Not true. Dot 5.1 are not Silicone based, but along with some Super dot 4's are Synthetic based. It is Dot 5 that is Silicone based and can't be mixed with other fluids. I have also read that Dot 5 fluid can't be used with ABS too. Dot 5.1 can be mixed with Dot,3,4 and Super 4.

If you want to buy fluid, then our Sponsor, Opie Oils is another good place.

Well you live and learn. I didnt realise it was DOT 5 being silicone based but DOT5.1 being glycol. I had always assumed any DoT 5 was silicone based.

I also use Opie oils as well. Top service and prices.

The grooves help stop the pads from glazing , they are an improvement over solid discs

http://www.apracing....rake_discs.aspx

True, but if you can manage the heat by better cooling, better pads, larger discs etc you can do without grooved discs as the likelihood of glazing will be much slimmer.

I bought a set of Zero Sixty grooved discs on my Octavia and tried them against standard at two consecutive weekends at the Nurburgring and I could tell absolutely no discernible difference between the two discs setups. It was a waste of £250 IMO. Maybe it would be a worthwhile shop if your discs need changing anyway, but my Octavia was pretty new when i took it there and swapped the discs.

Best off doing annual fluid changes with RBF600 as well or even more if you track the car often

100% agree.

My oil/filters and plugs get changed twice a year, and the fluid changed annually. If i did higher mileage i would probably change it more frequently.

I am not doing grooved discs, just muller the standard ones on the car, when they wear down, standard ones will go back on, I know from last time the Yellow stuff pads made a real impression on the discs at Oulton Park, do grooves increase surface area and therefore braking efficiency :think:

The pads ate the discs and left a full pattern of grooves in a radial pattern, they are still on and work ok.

The problem with uprating pads is some, like Pagids eat discs, pads such as DS2500 spit residue all over the alloys when they are really hot, pads like the Miuntex M1144 dont have the best bite from cold. You have to take so much into consideration with what you choose.

With my setup I was planning on doing some infrared temperature checks on my front brakes to see what sort of temperature range i was getting after 1, 3, 5, 10 and 15 lap runs as well as on the street. As mine run alot cooler than the stock setup, i was keen to see if it still required additional cooling, and if it did, to see what effect some cooling ducts had on the braking temperatures. This would then help me pick the optimum pads fro the temperature range my brakes experienced.

I noticed the other day our Superb has 65k on it and still on the original pads !

Going to need discs and pads shortly though

DS2500 aren't that bad for dust I used them on both my Skyline and my Evo , both went on track and the wheels always cleaned up easily.

Yellow stuff deposited loads of hard to shift debris on the alloys after Oulton Park.

On my Yeti we are 77K on the same pads and discs! Incredible.

I think yellow stuff are worse , I have them on my present r34 , don't think they are as good an all-round pad as the ds2500 either , luckily my wheels are gunmetal grey so it doesnt show up

Edited 28 April, 201313 yr by Richf

I don't leave them on as they are not good when cold as the wife found out going to work the day after Oulton Park, I got a phone call of expletives! When she calmed down she said the car doesn't stop! I changed the pads to the standard ones when she got home from work lol...

I think yellow stuff are worse , I have them on my present r34 , don't think they are as good an all-round pad as the ds2500 either ,

DS2500 are the best all round pad IMO. I wouldnt touch Yellowstuff again. I had them literally crumble into pieces on one of my old cars despite there still being about 8mm of pad remaining

I heard this about EBC pads, so I called them before I bought the pads, I was assured if there was any issue I could contact EBC and they would "resolve" any issue.

I know Korban had them all round on his Fabia at Combe.

EBC won't warranty them mate ! A mate of mine had his EBC discs crack within a few weeks of use they were used with yellow stuff and EBC washed their hands of it claiming they don't warranty "race" parts

I have been had then.