Hi guys,

Okay here's the issue....I don't like the brakes of the Fabia and never have but never made anything of it until today...why?? Because I had a tiny accident today...I hit my girlfriend's car from behind on a bridge...her Pug 206 sustained no damage, but my plate bent in and the bumper has come off alignment..nothing major at all...point is, the brakes are crap, and given the distance I was at my car should have stopped easy to avoid hitting her.

What are the steps I need to undergo? How much are 312mm brakes, from who should I buy them and how much would they go for? Also, do I need to buy 16"s to be able to have them fit or can I still keep the 15s?

I figure if I'm gonna keep the car for quite a while, I should upgrade because they are completely ****. I've had three to four frontal accidents from the time I bought the car and I blame alot of it on the poor brakes....funny enough, I've never been hit in the rear.

I'm taking my car in tonight for a number of things including this...PAS doesn't seem to be working properly, sometimes the steering hardens when I drive, and the doors lock on their own still.

Please advise.

Sorry to hear of your recent accident...

No offence but if you've had 3 - 4 frontal accidents and your blaming the breaks then you weren't at the appropiate stopping distance from the car infront.

Hi guys' date='

Okay here's the issue....I don't like the brakes of the Fabia and never have but never made anything of it until today...why?? Because I had a tiny accident today...I hit my girlfriend's car from behind on a bridge...her Pug 206 sustained no damage, but my plate bent in and the bumper has come off alignment..nothing major at all...point is, the brakes are crap, and given the distance I was at my car should have stopped easy to avoid hitting her.

What are the steps I need to undergo? How much are 312mm brakes, from who should I buy them and how much would they go for? Also, do I need to buy 16"s to be able to have them fit or can I still keep the 15s?

I figure if I'm gonna keep the car for quite a while, I should upgrade because they are completely ****. I've had three to four frontal accidents from the time I bought the car and I blame alot of it on the poor brakes....funny enough, I've never been hit in the rear.

I'm taking my car in tonight for a number of things including this...PAS doesn't seem to be working properly, sometimes the steering hardens when I drive, and the doors lock on their own still.

Please advise.[/quote']

Three or four frontal shunts?:eek:

Press the brakes sooner and harder would be my advice

Worth a check with a techie (lummox) to see if they go on, not sure what the 2.0l is like, but the lower fabias need vRS hubs to put bigger brakes on, don't they?

Also: are your tyres ok? as they will affect breaking tremendously.

Yep, speaking from experience you will need new outer hub housings and bearings, at about

Bigger brakes are gonna make naff all difference at low speed, the main advantage of bigger brakes is to reduce fade after continued heavy use. Tyre's and tyre pressure are gonna be a much bigger factor along with how big a gap you are leaving.

Hi guys' date='

Okay here's the issue....I don't like the brakes of the Fabia and never have but never made anything of it until today...why?? Because I had a tiny accident today...I hit my girlfriend's car from behind on a bridge...her Pug 206 sustained no damage, but my plate bent in and the bumper has come off alignment..nothing major at all...point is, the brakes are crap, and given the distance I was at my car should have stopped easy to avoid hitting her.

What are the steps I need to undergo? How much are 312mm brakes, from who should I buy them and how much would they go for? Also, do I need to buy 16"s to be able to have them fit or can I still keep the 15s?

I figure if I'm gonna keep the car for quite a while, I should upgrade because they are completely ****. I've had three to four frontal accidents from the time I bought the car and I blame alot of it on the poor brakes....funny enough, I've never been hit in the rear.

I'm taking my car in tonight for a number of things including this...PAS doesn't seem to be working properly, sometimes the steering hardens when I drive, and the doors lock on their own still.

Please advise.[/quote']

FFS don't blame the brakes if you've had 3 or 4 similar accidents.

Change the driving style before you hurt someone.

Seems that you haven't accounted for how much space you need to stop. As eddy said around town my 312mm dont stop any quicker that the old brakes did but the 17's + T1-R's do seem to make a difference over the 16's.

Not the answer you wanted really, maybe just upgrading the pads and discs might help?

To those who have tried advising, this is not for you.

I've had a very rough day and I have all of you telling me how I drive???

To h*ll with this. There is nothing wrong with my driving, and I always keep a safe distance. The same way you don't believe the 2.0 is a quick car your starting up on me with my driving and telling me how my brakes are. YOU DON'T DRIVE 2.0s NOW DO YOU????

Like I said, to h*ll with this. I should have sought help from more useful people who think before smacking people down. I WAS in a safe distance.

Black Magic, when someone asks for advice, don't reply with 'for f*cks sake' as a starter. I have a car that hardly anyone in here has, so I know what it's good with and what it isn't. So if you won't help you're better off not posting at all.

I should have never sought help from here in the first place.

I've had a very rough day and I have all of you telling me how I drive???

To h*ll with this. There is nothing wrong with my driving' date=' and I always keep a safe distance. The same way you don't believe the 2.0 is a quick car your starting up on me with my driving and telling me how my brakes are. YOU DON'T DRIVE 2.0s NOW DO YOU????

Like I said, to h*ll with this. I should have sought help from more useful people who think before smacking people down. I WAS in a safe distance.

I should have never sought help from here in the first place.[/quote']

You've had the car quite some time as you've told us. By now, crap brakes or not you should know the distance your car needs to stop.

All the posts in this thread seemed genuine to me and being as gentle as possible suggested prehaps the car wasn't to blame.

If the car really is to blame then it's unsafe and you shouldn't have been driving it so again your fault.

Grow up, take some responsibilty for your actions and don't have a go at people trying to offer help. I for one now wish I hadn't bothered.

You've had the car quite some time as you've told us. By now' date=' crap brakes or not you should know the distance your car needs to stop.

All the posts in this thread seemed genuine to me and being as gentle as possible suggested prehaps the car wasn't to blame.

If the car really is to blame then it's unsafe and you shouldn't have been driving it so again your fault.

Grow up, take some responsibilty for your actions and don't have a go at people trying to offer help. I for one now wish I hadn't bothered.[/quote']

Like I said, for those who tried advising, that WAS NOT for you. I know my responsibilities.

Not wanting to raise you blood pressure anymore I wont give a full reply :P ever though that your brakes might just need changing? How long have they been on the car? When was the last time the fluid was changed?

Also what was on the road any oil, sand oir grit that you may not have seen.

They were just changed 5000kms ago and the car was fully serviced.

What condition are the brakes in? When was the last time the fluid was changed?

Haven driven a few 1.2 fabia estates I found the brakes to be fine. I assume the front brakes are the same on the 2.0 apart from the rears?

But really. If you've had 4 front impacts they maybe you are too close. I assume you was using the 2 second rule?

Not wanting to raise you blood pressure anymore I wont give a full reply :P ever though that your brakes might just need changing? How long have they been on the car? When was the last time the fluid was changed?

Also what was on the road any oil' date=' sand oir grit that you may not have seen.[/quote']

beat me too it

To those who have tried advising' date=' this is not for you.

I've had a very rough day and I have all of you telling me how I drive???

To h*ll with this. There is nothing wrong with my driving, and I always keep a safe distance. The same way you don't believe the 2.0 is a quick car your starting up on me with my driving and telling me how my brakes are. YOU DON'T DRIVE 2.0s NOW DO YOU????

Like I said, to h*ll with this. I should have sought help from more useful people who think before smacking people down. I WAS in a safe distance.

Black Magic, when someone asks for advice, don't reply with 'for f*cks sake' as a starter. I have a car that hardly anyone in here has, so I know what it's good with and what it isn't. So if you won't help you're better off not posting at all.

I should have never sought help from here in the first place.[/quote']

Mil. I've had upgraded brakes fitted the 312mm that everyone raves about. I didn't think they were any better, I also change a lot between wheel sizes so the 312's don't fit under my 15" wheels for example. Everyone has their own opinion. I now run standard brakes with upgraded pads. The 312's are sitting in the shed, I may try them another day to see. I had them on for my last trackday and once they cooked they faded a lot worse than the standard ones. Probably due to less cooling with being large diameter. Also they locked up the trackday tyres too much in the wet beating the ABS.

edit

BM you've locked yours up? Cool!!! lol

I've found that the 312mm stopped the problems I had with the old brakes. Which kept having the ABS kick in, which often ended up leaving me with no faith in them.

Yep, speaking from experience you will need new outer hub housings and bearings, at about

Nice fuse fitted to ALB ( private road use only ). The 312's don't sit well in the 16" wheels for cooling and didn't fit the 15". Fine with 17"

As to not activating the ABS with the 312's as opposed to 288's that would suggest less stopping power ?

I've locked mine up - something to do with lack of ABS.

With regards to poor performing brakes - If brakes are OK one minute, bad the next, then something is wrong. :(

If the pedal takes more power to get the same performance then you could be looking at worn out brake pads, tired discs, or maybe air in the pipework causing more fade symptoms. If the brakes are getting too hot (does a hotter climate make them warm up more? :confused: ) maybe simply the brakes are performing worse when used a lot. Ways around this are:

Bigger brakes, more pad in contact with metal

Vented discs - better cooling effect

Better pad compound, for same size (not as effective as bigger overall though)

Better brake fluid, say 5.1, to reduce brakes cooking.

I've gone from what I suspect is the same 256mm braking setup, to the TT 312mm setup, and it ROCKS! Never known brakes like them on a car I have personally owned. However, I did use normal discs, but just uprated pads and brake fluid, and this helped a great deal over the norm. Looking back, the difference fitting 312s has made makes just changing pads and fluid seem marginal by comparison.

Not wanting to sound dispariging (sp?) in any way, if your brakes do cook a bit / overheat and stopping distances worsen, then this needs taking into account in every day driving. I won't say I use smaller stopping distances since fitting big brakes, but I have more confidence in (more) late-braking for junctions. As stopping distances are 95% down to reaction time, not brake performance, I've not changed this at all.

In summary, in your shoes I would look for the big brakes & hubs if I could afford it, otherwise invest say

Mil, hate to sound patronising, but 4 frontal accidents - surely the car is to blame

I passed an advanced driving test a little while back, and one of the best things it taught me is to be able to stop in the "distance I can see to be clear". Try putting it into practise and hopefully frontal impacts will be a thing of the past.

With regards to upgrades, if I were you I'd be looking for some upgraded pads, maybe DS2500s and some upgraded fluid. Maybe some new OEM disks.

Are they ventilated as standard?

There is nothing wrong with my driving, and I always keep a safe distance.

If you have run into the back of things four times , then you clearly weren't at a safe distance.

You should always be able to stop in the distance that you can see to be clear.

If you brakes are weaker than you'd like then stay further back.

Having owned a Fabia for a week 'n' a couple of hours I'm obviously an expert

I find the Fabia quiet so sometimes I find myself going faster than I think. The front dips quite a lot on initial braking and this can fool me into thinking I'm stopping quicker than I am. The brake pedal's a little sensitive on initial braking too, which doesn't help.

My list of excuses for future accidents ends here.

J.

I've exchanged a couple of PM's with Mil and I suspect the tyre pressures are little high but would like to see what others think. He has been recommended to set them to 36psi. This sounds a little high to me, especially given the warm climate in Mil's part of the world which will increase the pressure even more when the tyre's are in use.

My suggestion would be find a nice quiet straight road and use a fixed marker to measure your stopping distance from 30mph. Let some pressure out and try again. I would think 30-32psi (measured when cold e.g. on a morning before the car has been driven) would be more appropriate.

This is of course is assuming your brake discs, pads and fluid are all ok.