brake pads for the track?

victorofhavoc said:

Does anyone know what brands and types of brake pads we have available to us? I'm struggling to find decent options for the PP GTI. G-loc only makes the fronts. Ferodo only makes the DS2500. Carbotech will make me pads, but wants my arm, leg, and left testicle to do it.

I've tried multiple variations of EBC and Hawk over the years with multiple cars, and recently on the GTI as well, and they have all been terrible for sustained heat. Autocross and street sure, but not sustained heat lap after lap.

Anyone familiar with the ferodo ds2500? They seem to be more of an autocross and street pad, but i wonder how they might hold up under track use?

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dont waste your money on the ferodo's. you will regret the purchase.

I just noticed Ferodo makes the OEM rear pad for US PP GTIs. Sorry just noticed..

crild said:

LOL are you joking? Ferodo makes the worst pads. The OEM pads are better than the ds2500s. material transfer with the 2500's is so bad you have to remove the rotors after every day to clean the material off otherwise the vibrations you get on day 2 is unreal. You couldnt pay me to run them. Worst decision i've made was to try them.

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It's not just the 2500's that transfer material often. Here's my MX72 on DBA 4000 T3 from yesterday. Rotor temps went above 1166f during hot laps. Pads are fine (and can take heat up over 1300f). Zero fade on track, zero vibration, did great all day.

Driving these around town are perfectly fine ... no noise, vibration, etc. However, when stopping from higher speeds they're very loud. It's a deep growl sort of noise. Hoping some normal daily driving will clean these up eventually. Pain in the ass, though.

Here's mine after a weekend. Steering wheel would vibrate so bad it almost rips out of your hands. Gotta pull rotors off to wash them tomorrow so I can brake on the street without vibration.

^ Damn, dude. Thought mine was bad until seeing those.

Huge pain in the ass though. The OEM brakes fade out and smoke so we replace them with equipment that is better suited - only to run into this crap. Maybe better ventilation is in order?

CDM MK7 said:

^ Damn, dude. Thought mine was bad until seeing those.

Huge pain in the ass though. The OEM brakes fade out and smoke so we replace them with equipment that is better suited - only to run into this crap. Maybe better ventilation is in order?

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I have rs3 brake ducts. The pads are garbage. Waste of $180.

crild said:

I have rs3 brake ducts. The pads are garbage. Waste of $180.

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Did you just do front pads? Did you go through the bed in process the manufacturer recommended?

If not those, what pads would you recommend?

victorofhavoc said:

Did you just do front pads? Did you go through the bed in process the manufacturer recommended?

If not those, what pads would you recommend?

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Yes. Yes. Either switching to pagid or going with a bbk.

This is the color of calipers that have gotten hot. My calipers haven't been anything close to black for more than a year. This is also a new set of rotors after 5 track days with new Ferodo pads. The pads and rotors were installed late April and this photo was taken a month later, the week before Memorial Day. I was installing the ti shims preparing for a Laguna Seca event when I took the photo. Those who are interested in the shims note that the ears on the shims need to be ground down to 5mm wide in order to fit. The pads were shot after the next track day but the rotors are fine.

I've had nothing but great results with the Ferodo pads. They have an aggressive bed in process that is clearly stated in box and on website that appears to have been followed. I've been street/track combo driving for many years and miles, and these are the best I've used. I still recommend them highly.



I guess YMMV.

So what is it exactly that causes some pads to deposit so badly? I know that your braking "style" plays a part ... some people brake very timidly and drag the brake into corners, trail brake a lot, etc. I was always taught to brake aggressively, for the shortest time possible as to not add additional heat into the system. Yet, my setup gets crazy hot and I get uneven deposits.

I'm on the non-PP brake setup, which I know is rather small for the car. However, I thought a higher temp, good quality pad and rotor would mediate that issue somewhat. The setup feels awesome on track and has really impressive levels of bite.

CDM MK7 said:

So what is it exactly that causes some pads to deposit so badly? I know that your braking "style" plays a part ... some people brake very timidly and drag the brake into corners, trail brake a lot, etc. I was always taught to brake aggressively, for the shortest time possible as to not add additional heat into the system. Yet, my setup gets crazy hot and I get uneven deposits.

I'm on the non-PP brake setup, which I know is rather small for the car. However, I thought a higher temp, good quality pad and rotor would mediate that issue somewhat. The setup feels awesome on track and has really impressive levels of bite.

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I've seen pads glaze for a few reasons, but the biggest by far is a failure to properly bed pads. Not getting rotors skimmed between different pad types (semi metallic to ceramic swap for example) and then failing to bed pads means the material didn't transfer like it should initially. I've also seen rotors get so hot they have tiny micdofractures that act kind of like poorly designed slots, but instead of cutting through the pad, they cut into bits of it, making both surfaces uneven. If the latter is the case you'd see tiny veins on the rotor upon close inspection. It's known as crazing.

It can also happen from crappy pads in general, but ferodo isn't known for making bad pads, and usually the culprits are off brand track day pads that don't have consistent material surfaces or are held together by a crappy bonding agent.

victorofhavoc said:

I've seen pads glaze for a few reasons, but the biggest by far is a failure to properly bed pads. Not getting rotors skimmed between different pad types (semi metallic to ceramic swap for example) and then failing to bed pads means the material didn't transfer like it should initially. I've also seen rotors get so hot they have tiny micdofractures that act kind of like poorly designed slots, but instead of cutting through the pad, they cut into bits of it, making both surfaces uneven. If the latter is the case you'd see tiny veins on the rotor upon close inspection. It's known as crazing.

It can also happen from crappy pads in general, but ferodo isn't known for making bad pads, and usually the culprits are off brand track day pads that don't have consistent material surfaces or are held together by a crappy bonding agent.

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I've had issues in the past (on previous cars) with Hawk pads and the crummy bonding agents they use on the HPS and HP+ so I'm definitely familiar with that scenario. Was just a little surprised to see this on the MX72, although I'm not convinced it's their fault. Perhaps the XDS system had something to do with this considering I don't have an LSD? Come to think of it, that actually makes a lot of sense ... there were definitely times in big sweeper corners that the XDS was firing off trying to keep me on track. THAT would be a time where a lot of extra heat could be introduced without me actually braking. Meaning, times where the brakes SHOULD have been cooling off, they weren't. Hmmm. Maybe time for OBD11 to shut that thing off/down?

I had definitely bedded these pads/rotors properly. Both were brand new, I followed the Endless procedure to the "T", brought the rotors up over 856f so proper heat was applied, and a perfectly even glaze of blue was on the rotors before I hit the track. I drove on them for a few thousand miles on the street and they've been absolutely perfect.

Still love this setup, but having them deposit on me is incredibly annoying.

CDM MK7 said:

I've had issues in the past (on previous cars) with Hawk pads and the crummy bonding agents they use on the HPS and HP+ so I'm definitely familiar with that scenario. Was just a little surprised to see this on the MX72, although I'm not convinced it's their fault. Perhaps the XDS system had something to do with this considering I don't have an LSD? Come to think of it, that actually makes a lot of sense ... there were definitely times in big sweeper corners that the XDS was firing off trying to keep me on track. THAT would be a time where a lot of extra heat could be introduced without me actually braking. Meaning, times where the brakes SHOULD have been cooling off, they weren't. Hmmm. Maybe time for OBD11 to shut that thing off/down?

I had definitely bedded these pads/rotors properly. Both were brand new, I followed the Endless procedure to the "T", brought the rotors up over 856f so proper heat was applied, and a perfectly even glaze of blue was on the rotors before I hit the track. I drove on them for a few thousand miles on the street and they've been absolutely perfect.

Still love this setup, but having them deposit on me is incredibly annoying.

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XDS should only be acting in the rear as far as i'm aware, unless that's only on the PP GTI models??

Hawk pads are junk for anything other than street/autocross. They caused a lot of warping on my old rotors on my wrx as well.

What rotors did you get? I see they're slotted. Most of the guys I've talked to in the racing world and those who are heavy into hpde/track events stay far away from slotted because supposedly they eat pads unnaturally. The idea is that the slot is supposed to wipe the pad clean and push material out when wet. There's a disadvantage in the dry because you lose some of the contact surface you would have otherwise. The GTI and R both pulsate the brakes while it's raining anyway, so there's really no need for a rotor that's geared towards wet weather. Everyone is aware of the obvious large cracks that develop around drilled rotor's holes, but slotted can also have cracks, just not as large. These cracks (crazing) can only be seen when you get really close to the rotor while it's still hot (expanded metal) and sometimes the pad glaze can reveal them more clearly as well.

To avoid crazing, some rotor manufacturers will claim certain rotors for certain temps, and that's based entirely on the type of metal they use. The higher the carbon content, the less warping will exist due to the atomic bonds that carbon makes (4 of them, and very strong ones) with ferrous materials. Carbon helps to essentially make metal more like a wall, rather than a rock if you can picture that metaphor on the atomic level. Less warping means the pad has a more consistent surface to grab to, less chance of scoring the pad, and less chance of cracks developing. If you've ever seen the bi-metallic fuses within a breaker box, it's essentially the goal of a good rotor to avoid that action. If all metals were 100% pure this would not be an issue, but ferrous carbon materials are known for how they love to bond (think about how much rust builds on a rotor).

There are also cryo treated rotors, which are essentially brought down to a temperature at which the molecules within the metal are losing reactivity and the bonding structure is formed into a tighter shape (think ice cube vs water). These do work in preventing some warping, however, the effects are not as great as moving to a higher carbon content rotor.

From personal experience, I'd say the chances of glazing happening as a result of an event are: improper bed in/cool down, pad material/bonding agent, warped rotor, drilled holes/cracks, crazing, pad heat, caliper pressure (boiled fluid or piston pressure).

Based on the responses above, I'd say the weak areas for the gti/r are the rotor cooling, fluid, pad, caliper contact. Better vented rotors with more carbon, better fluid, better pad, and the Ti shims seem to solve a decent chunk of the issues. I'd warn against anyone just jumping on a BBK bandwagon without proper ABS distribution testing. Rear braking can be significantly affected by going to a more voluminous front caliper since that can drastically change overall pad pressure. Stoptech is famous for engineering designs strictly to fit an ABS application, but other take off parts are not so great. I'd stay very far from away from generic BBK setups like wilwood, brembo, and others. If they don't have data to present on the caliper pressure pre/post it's not worth the risk. The TTRS calipers may be a good solution since the appropriate size is kept and they have the same ABS unit (as far as I'm aware), but the rotor will make a bigger difference than the caliper anyway. Also, the R and GTI like to understeer from the factory, but the rear brakes are stronger than the front so trail braking seems to do a lot in terms of rotation. I recommend both front and rear pads be changed at the same time to keep a balance between the two.

victorofhavoc said:

Hawk pads are junk for anything other than street/autocross. They caused a lot of warping on my old rotors on my wrx as well.

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Disagree. Hawk DTC-60 work very well on the track and street. No issues.