Brake disc upgrade, worth it?

[grandadchris]

Aright boys and girls,

 

Had my FL Vrs TSI for about three months now and still loving it. However, starting to get comfortable pushing it now (nowt mad) and I’m quite underwhelmed by hard braking from nsl speeds. Granted this is a quite substantial car compared to the sub ton frenchies I’m used to but still. 
 

so anyway , my plans are frerodo ds2000/road spec pads (didn’t realise the dd2500 ones were “illegal”😬), braided lines and a fluid change.
I’m unsure about discs though. The go to for the clios I used to run was brembo “high carbon” discs but these seem to only be for RS clios. The brembo discs at ECP seem to just be standard replacement? 
 

there are however some very flash vagbremtechnic ones on awesomegti which have my attention. They obvious come at a premium though. 
 

So what’s the consensus on upgraded discs then? Worth it? Too much outlay for minimum gain?

 

TL;DR are upgraded/track day discs worth it for road use with occasional ‘spirited’ driving. 
 

thanks. 😊
 

 

[Camlobe]

tl;dr version:

 

In my view, no.

 

Given your screen name, I'll comment that I can be fairly accused of driving like a granddad myself, these days, and these are my views, and it will be easy to find people who have the opposite view.

 

Real 'flashy' disks are cross drilled and grooved (ok, this is 'fronts', which make most of the difference, so vented is assumed), and may even be made of a flashy material.

 

So, I am sure that cross drilled and grooved can make a big difference in wet conditions. But, in the dry, or when at least the pads haven't been soaked in water? I have my doubts.

 

I once had the situation where the brakes didn't work because water, and that was dramatic, and unexpected. I think the pads had crazed, and that helped them retain water.

 

This is quite a dramatic situation, and one question you have to ask yourself is 'Do I have worse brakes in the wet?' and particularly if the brakes take some time to grip, then there is a serious case for considering measures to get the steam out of the way.

 

If you do have wet problems, and it is the brakes and not the tyres, then there is a very strong case for expensive disks, otherwise I'd say no.

 

Assuming you go with standard-ish disks, then I would say there is a god case for going for the best pads you can. The trouble with that is actually determining which are the best pads. When I had that problem with wet, it was with Mintex Extremes, and they should have been good, but in that set of conditions they weren't as good as the older 1144 pads, by a long, long way. 

 

Oh, and if you don't like what you've got with 'better' pads, you can always then buy 'better' disks.

 

Incidentally, the 'illegal pads' thing:

 

Regulation 90 constrains the 'mu' (coeff of friction) in to a fairly narrow box. You might say 'but I don't care about that'. Unfortunately, with all the stuff like ABS and stability control, the brakes are now inside a feedback loop, and you can get really bizarre effects if you do change mu dramatically.  So, even if you don't like it, something like regulation 90 was probably inevitable, even if you'd feel better served by information on the upper useful temp of the pads.

Edited 10 June, 2021 by Camlobe
miss-spellering (x 2)

[grandadchris]

RE my user name, I made this account about 8-9 years ago when I was in my early twenties and used to run various retro sleepers dressed up like beige brigade run abouts. Not a great idea in hindsight as I used to get pulled over all the time lol. 
 

good shout on trying the regular discs first. Not a huge loss if the end up swapped out anyway. 
 

I do understand the point of the efficacy of set ups that you need some heat in to work optimally, even so they were still better than most “regular” car’s brakes, but obviously there’s a line that needs to be drawn somewhere. 

[Gissin]

what condition are the current disk and pads in? when was it last fluid changed and bled this can make a massive difference, FWIW I'm running pagid discs and pads with a recent fluid change,  my cars remapped and stops quick.. very quick if needed, so std kit shouldn't be a problem.

 

I'd stay away from drilled discs they can crack around the holes, C/J hook are a decent upgrade if you do end up going down that route. 

[Camlobe]

In a way, I'm a bit disappointed that no one has yet turned up to argue for disks made from an unobtanium/nihonium alloy, with a surface finish patterned on the Nazca lines.

 

One comment I should have made is that you want to check that the pad manufacturer does recommend their pads for use on plain disks. I know, brembo, for example makes a point that their max pads are not just suitable for their max disks, but also for plain ones.

 

Also watch out for the PR number; that indicates whose brake system you have (and is probably different front to rear), so you need to get the right PR code. Some people will check this from the car reg plate (assuming the car still corresponds to the original brake system, which will be true in most cases). Other people don't do this check, and/or give you a PR code for you to check.

 

Caveat emptor, and all that kind of thing. 

[Warrior193]

I believe that there is a modern version of the DS11 pad compound available - I found this very good for anti-fade qualities on the oversized (plain) discs on my rally car of long ago. Only slight drawback was having to condition them - and to maintain the pad surface once conditioned.

[Patch27]

Have you thought a caliper upgrade?

 

I run S3 345mm Brakes up front and use brembo high carbon discs and pads from the xtra range, they stop unbelievable well compared to the standard 312mm brakes that were on it.

[vRSy]

There will be a negligible difference in performance between brake discs, just stick go OEM or equivalents.

 

Braking performance is all in the pads,unless you're looking at bigger discs or calipers.

 

Also avoid drilled discs, there's a reason we don't race with them.

[grandadchris]

On 11/06/2021 at 15:16, Patch27 said:

Have you thought a caliper upgrade?

 

I run S3 345mm Brakes up front and use brembo high carbon discs and pads from the xtra range, they stop unbelievable well compared to the standard 312mm brakes that were on it.

Is the S3 (8v?) a straight swap? You’ve peaked my interest with this. Also, I couldn’t find info anywhere on the Brembo Xtra being the HC variant. Great info. Cheers. 
 

Also also, those vagbremtechnic discs on awesome gti look to be oem but j-hooked. Not that much more (~£80 per 4) than brembos at ECP but not worth it IMO. (I’m dumb and thought ECP had them £80 a pair)

[Patch27]

8p and 8v are both straight swaps, the 8p uses 345mm, 8v uses 340mm disc.

The calipers differ in design and piston size, I went for 345mm as it works well with the octavia master cylinder, the bigger piston would need more pedal travel before they bite.

Discs and pads can be bought from autodoc, wait till Friday and they will be 40% discount. Match day madness.

 

Hey, check out BREMBO Brake Disc in the AUTODOC app https://m.autodoc.co.uk/brembo/13801757

 

Hey, check out BREMBO Brake Disc in the AUTODOC app https://m.autodoc.co.uk/brembo/13801758

 

 

Hey, check out BREMBO Brake Pad Set, disc brake in the AUTODOC app https://m.autodoc.co.uk/brembo/13802391

[Camlobe]

A word of warning about Autodoc: Price and selection of parts can be good, but delivery can be a bit slow, and badly defined, so it can be difficult to know if parts will arrive on time, if you are on a tight schedule.

 

Also, in this case, you'd expect a bit more warning about the various different brake systems.

[wd20]

Reminds me of when fitting harder pads on "Tarox" discs many years ago. Went back to OEM pads in the end. For normal driving OEM pads work fine as harder pads need more heat to work well. As previous post mentions Caliper/Pad upgrade preferred way. Restrictions are "Hydraulics" ie master cylinder ratio ?

[Patch27]

https://www.facebook.com/711893365667754/posts/1614982762025472/

 

345mm Calipers here for sale £180