Brake Fade life
 

Sooo just a heads up for anyone wanting to do a serious mountain run or absolutely any track day (not autocross). The stock pads heat and fade insanely fast! Ran the mountain hard and had almost 0 brakes on the first 1/4.... had to completely change the way I was running to compensate for the brakes. Changing to Project Mu400 series. If that doesnt work in November ill be going to full track pads.

Did you have the nannies on? Did you do the pedal dance? Do you drive an auto?

It's not like you can't fade the stock pads but your problem is more likely the stock fluid. I ran the stock pads with RBF600 fluid on track and I had a mostly fade free experience although they wear quickly when hot.

I found the OEM fluid gave up way before the OEM pads ever did. I am sure they filled up with the bare minimum DOT 3.

OP, did you have a soft pedal going to the floor, or a firm pedal?

Also, full track pads are a terrible idea on a daily driven car. They are often terrible when below their minimum operating temperature (which is typically very high). And the ones that aren't terrible when cold...get that way by eating your rotors alive. You'll know because when it rains, all that "brake pad" dust suddenly becomes rust.

Manual and yes I kept all the nannies on. Traction only kicked on twice and that was going into the corners

The mu400 seem to be a good in between pad. And soft over half way down. That's with a cylinder brace too

Meh... i daily PMU Club Racers, don't have many issues aside from shitloads of brake dust and some occasional noise. They bite just fine cold, even better under high temps, and I'm still on stock rotors after a handful of track days and countless canyon runs.

Though I don't necessarily disagree with the above as it's typically sound advice across several platforms, I'd say take it all with a grain of salt, and know that it's not so exaggeratively horrible, depending on your surroundings and daily routes of course.. :burnrubber:

P.s. they are asking about traction control because that generates the most heat

This is hugely important stuff to look at before addressing brake issues. I got bad pad fade with a firm pedal on all stock stuff, but it was a track known to be really hard on brake systems.

That's not true for all track pads. I daily drive project mU club racers and they have cold bite equal (or better) than stock, aren't hard on rotors at all, and the dust doesn't rust or fuse to wheels. They dust a lot, and aren't always quiet, but they're really not that bad.

With all respect intended to the OP, he sounds like he's new to performance driving (especially given that he attacked a mountain road with stock pads and fluid). The last thing he needs is to run out and buy full track pads. An aggressive but streetable pad, plus some good fluid, plus some driving experience (don't use brakes! They slow you down!) will do him wonders.

Those who are already in the know don't need my advice.

No experience with that pad but temp range looks reasonable for what you're doing.

Generally there's two failure modes with brakes:

1. Fluid too hot and starts to boil. As more air accumulates in the lines, you get a softer and softer pedal which means less force applied to the pads. Keep going like this and eventually the pedal will reach the floor.

2. Pads too hot - they will outgas excessively to the point that it starts creating a barrier between the pad and the rotor. Your pedal will stay the same but you just won't slow down as much.

Either of these situations can feed into the other. The ideal, most efficient way to brake in a performance environment is maximum brake force you can apply without locking the wheels for as short a duration as possible. Once you encounter either of these failure modes you have to drag on the brakes longer, which exacerbates the situation i.e. your pads start to fade, so you brake longer, which makes them fade more while also heating your fluid more.

Obviously in a mountain/canyon environment you need to leave some margin for errors like gravel on the road, ABS ice mode, misjudging the corner, etc. I strongly recommend you find a race track to get your fix in. If you get it wrong you generally just go off track a bit with no drama. "Off track" in the mountains can mean a 100 foot drop.

I have 0 performance driving experience in a car besides a drag strip in high school lol. I have a lot of track experience on motorcycles I use to race 1000cc Cbr. But car techniques I am really just learning.

If you understand stuff like the friction circle then a lot of the basic fundamentals will transfer over. It's just the controls that are different. ;)

Definitely get to a NASA event or something, they have instructors that can probably pick up on your past motorcycle experience and help translate that to a car.

Yea that would probably help a lot lol. Right now I'm just going off of how hard the car lets me push it and try to feel out when the tires are about to lose it. With a bike it's all about your body and throttle control in the corners to shift the suspension to the rear wheel. No idea how that translates to 4 wheels right now lol. First time I have ever experienced any brake lose like I did. Never had that on a bike but I used the brakes maybe 2 turns on the entire track when I ran it. Sounds like it was a fluid problem though from the way y'all are explaining it

The NS400 pads are very stock like, I've been autocrossing them this summer and they aren't providing the stopping power I want, I'm getting the sense that I'm close to overheating them (but I'm due for a fluid flush). I would not even think about putting them on track, even with my n00b experience level I would expect them to be roasted in under 10 minutes in at the two local tracks I've been at, 2-4 laps depending on course/layout. Someone with more talent (or stupidity) could probably fry them in well under 10 braking zones, not even one flying lap.

I cooked my OE pads on my second track day, scary drive home.

Great street pads, but not really huge upgrade over stock imo. Definitely do a fluid flush when you swap pads, RBF 600/660 is really the intermediate step up from ATE Typ 200 which is the step up from OE/cheap stuff.

I'd try them out, doesn't hurt to gain the experience. Hopefully they'll survive your 'spirited' driving problem free. But for more serious track/autox I suspect you'll be looking for an upgrade sooner rather than later. HC800, DS2500, AX6 are the go-to hybrid pads that I'll be choosing from once my NS400's are gone.