yellow stuff brake pads
Discussion
nicke999 said:
this is a little review on these pads fitted to a Aston Martin DB9 s
AM pads - went through both front and rears at 10,000 miles, thats with one track day. yellow stuff pads still going strong, i will replace at 16,000 (with 2 track days and some high speed stuff in Europe) (done 13,000 so far in them) very little brake dust, great feel, good at low speed and high speed, and none of that squeaking noise going on.
costs AM £452.8 vs yellows £243.8 (pads alone) ----- per mile AM 45p vs yellows 15p per mile
nick
right then - my next review of these yellow stuff pads.AM pads - went through both front and rears at 10,000 miles, thats with one track day. yellow stuff pads still going strong, i will replace at 16,000 (with 2 track days and some high speed stuff in Europe) (done 13,000 so far in them) very little brake dust, great feel, good at low speed and high speed, and none of that squeaking noise going on.
costs AM £452.8 vs yellows £243.8 (pads alone) ----- per mile AM 45p vs yellows 15p per mile
nick
purchased in March 2009, replaced 30th March 2011 - completed 19,000 miles - the rears were down to the wire and i recon the fronts had another 5,000 miles in them. very little brake dust, and never a squeak out of them. In that time they have been subjected too some hard driving, local town work, high speed stuff, and the odd track fun.
i have to say - i'm impressed - in terms of wear on the disc, i have noticed a ridge on the fronts, and nothing on the rears, but im not sure if that is what you expect from a 50k car.
so thats the yellows.
now i have just fitted the new blue stuff pads. initially they needed a little persuading to fit into the rears, but other than that easy. initial running in, they seem fine, good grip and not a sound from them, will update you all in due course on how they bed in.
nick
My Bluestuff NDX have been in for a week or so now, about 1k miles... I'm really happy with them. Once warmed up feel is fantastic, you can lean & lean on them, safe in the knowledge there's more to come. The progressive feel from them is really confidence inspiring.
I've even found myself having to recalibrate my braking distances for corners I know really well!
So far I'm bloody impressed! Obviously more time is needed for a better impression but so far it's a massive
from me 
I've even found myself having to recalibrate my braking distances for corners I know really well!
So far I'm bloody impressed! Obviously more time is needed for a better impression but so far it's a massive
from me jon- said:
Thanks for the write up Nick, let us know how they compare to the yellows once they are bedded in as I fancy a set of these on my track car.
As for your pence per mile pad cost figures in your quoted message... I suggest double checking them
hahaha - well give or take a decimal placeAs for your pence per mile pad cost figures in your quoted message... I suggest double checking them
so the results are
aston martin pads 4.5p a mile
1st set of yellows 1.5p a mile
2nd set of yellows 1p a mile
how's that!! lol
Well I've finally had the chance to give the NDX blue-stuffs a try out. Despite them not being bedded in yet, I am very very impressed with them.
The bite is much much better than the standard Brembos, and the modulation is also improved over standard. Didn't really test their fade resistance as was bedding in, but so far they're a thumbs up from me.
The bite is much much better than the standard Brembos, and the modulation is also improved over standard. Didn't really test their fade resistance as was bedding in, but so far they're a thumbs up from me.
Well I have had the Yellowstuff on the MG ZS now for 6 months, front and rear, thanks again to Andy at EBC for letting me trial them for nothing.
This is a tale of two halves - the front and rear pads. The rear setup on mine is 239mm discs (tiny), with small pads, and the system has ABS/EBD. The EBD should make the rear brake bias close to optimum. However, this setup does not get adequate heat into the rear discs and pads. When the front dics can be very hot the rears are just slightly hot. I have found a couple of times that the handbrake has become poor, and does not hold the car well at a normal level of effort on the handbrake lever. So I have had to rebed the rear pads to overcome this - handbrake on, 50mph for 1/4-1/2 a mile a couple of times does the trick. I assume this re-establishes a layer of pad materia on the disc. I had the same handbrake problem with some bog standard Mintex red box pads I fitted temporarily, but those were much worse for it. The downside of having to re-bed the rear pads aggressively has been that they are about 1/2 worn now after only about 5,000 miles, so I may need to replace them prematurely. By the way the brakes are not binding and the handbrake mechanism is not seized, ABS is showing no faults.
So on the rear, the Yellowstuff seem require more heat than my setup can provide to work reliably, and I will not use them again on the rear brakes. I will consider Greenstuff in the future though.
For the front brakes using Yellowstuff, things are quite a bit better. Wear levels are okay, I would say they are about 1/4-1/3 worn now after 6,000 miles, and that has included a few more aggressive bedding in cycles than strictly necessary, with a small lip on the disc, not excessive compared to other pads I would say. I accidentally wiped out a set of Mintex M1144 by doing a similar type of bed-in procedure I have given the Yellowstuff pads, so based on this the Yellowstuff should be more capable on track than the Mintex pads.
Day to day the Yellowstuff give a bit of a dead feel to the brake pedal initially, and seem to need a little bit of heat in them to really start working. However, this might just be corrosion built up when the car has been sat which needs cleaning up, as even on a long motorway run, when using the brakes for the first time in ages, they work quite well. Or maybe they get enough heat very quickly at higher speeds to make the braking event feel okay, not sure on this.
They have not squealed at all, and brake dust is moderate IMHO, better than Mintex M1144 (what could be worse?), but I try to clean them once a week anyway, even if I don't wash the car, as after 2 weeks or more the dust can stick quite hard into the lacquer on the alloy wheels if I have not waxed them in over a month (use Collinite 915 to wax the wheels by the way, seems to be one of the better waxes on wheels, I've tried 5-6 different things).
I do find that the Yellowstuff need a good thrashing occasionally to keep them at their best, presumably this is so some pad material can be re-deposited on the disc for optimum performance. Day to day low speed town driving means the pads lose their edge and need a little bit of stick to restore performance. Not a problem for me, but not ideal for the masses, of course this is not the Yellowstuff target market so not really a big deal.
Where the Yellowstuff really excel is during the higher speed stuff, which is good, as that is their market. While I only have the Mintex M1144 to compare them to from the "high performance" pad arena, I would say they definitely don't embarass themselves, in fact seem good all on their own merits. The bite gets better and better as the brakes heat up, I have not managed to make them fade at all, and in my car with it's small 262mm front discs and 1300kg of mass, approx. 140bhp, this is a good sign. This setup is a bit under-disked at the front compared to many, and I have had fade problems with previous pads - old Black Diamond Perdators and Halfrauds ones (really awful pad).
More plus points are that the Yellowstuff do not grab at all, I have not had ABS activate in a big way since having them fitted (apart from on snow), only the odd moment when braking hard-ish while driving over a very rough surface. The pads want to haul the car down from speed in an efficient, predictable and fuss free manner, even when pressing on. I think the coefficient of friction could be a touch higher for my car, as it is under-servoed compared to many, but they are not seriously lacking at all, unlike the old Halfrauds pads fitted when I bought the car.
Based on my experience with them, I am fairly confident they would be good enough for a few track days laps at a time, hopefully I will get to test that out soon.
So overall I rate them at 8/10 for my car and my driving style - town driving mainly, some higher speed stuff, with the occasional mildly enthusiastic drive, on a car with small discs fitted for its weight and power, which demands a decent pad as a result, and they would probably work well on track.
This is a tale of two halves - the front and rear pads. The rear setup on mine is 239mm discs (tiny), with small pads, and the system has ABS/EBD. The EBD should make the rear brake bias close to optimum. However, this setup does not get adequate heat into the rear discs and pads. When the front dics can be very hot the rears are just slightly hot. I have found a couple of times that the handbrake has become poor, and does not hold the car well at a normal level of effort on the handbrake lever. So I have had to rebed the rear pads to overcome this - handbrake on, 50mph for 1/4-1/2 a mile a couple of times does the trick. I assume this re-establishes a layer of pad materia on the disc. I had the same handbrake problem with some bog standard Mintex red box pads I fitted temporarily, but those were much worse for it. The downside of having to re-bed the rear pads aggressively has been that they are about 1/2 worn now after only about 5,000 miles, so I may need to replace them prematurely. By the way the brakes are not binding and the handbrake mechanism is not seized, ABS is showing no faults.
So on the rear, the Yellowstuff seem require more heat than my setup can provide to work reliably, and I will not use them again on the rear brakes. I will consider Greenstuff in the future though.
For the front brakes using Yellowstuff, things are quite a bit better. Wear levels are okay, I would say they are about 1/4-1/3 worn now after 6,000 miles, and that has included a few more aggressive bedding in cycles than strictly necessary, with a small lip on the disc, not excessive compared to other pads I would say. I accidentally wiped out a set of Mintex M1144 by doing a similar type of bed-in procedure I have given the Yellowstuff pads, so based on this the Yellowstuff should be more capable on track than the Mintex pads.
Day to day the Yellowstuff give a bit of a dead feel to the brake pedal initially, and seem to need a little bit of heat in them to really start working. However, this might just be corrosion built up when the car has been sat which needs cleaning up, as even on a long motorway run, when using the brakes for the first time in ages, they work quite well. Or maybe they get enough heat very quickly at higher speeds to make the braking event feel okay, not sure on this.
They have not squealed at all, and brake dust is moderate IMHO, better than Mintex M1144 (what could be worse?), but I try to clean them once a week anyway, even if I don't wash the car, as after 2 weeks or more the dust can stick quite hard into the lacquer on the alloy wheels if I have not waxed them in over a month (use Collinite 915 to wax the wheels by the way, seems to be one of the better waxes on wheels, I've tried 5-6 different things).
I do find that the Yellowstuff need a good thrashing occasionally to keep them at their best, presumably this is so some pad material can be re-deposited on the disc for optimum performance. Day to day low speed town driving means the pads lose their edge and need a little bit of stick to restore performance. Not a problem for me, but not ideal for the masses, of course this is not the Yellowstuff target market so not really a big deal.
Where the Yellowstuff really excel is during the higher speed stuff, which is good, as that is their market. While I only have the Mintex M1144 to compare them to from the "high performance" pad arena, I would say they definitely don't embarass themselves, in fact seem good all on their own merits. The bite gets better and better as the brakes heat up, I have not managed to make them fade at all, and in my car with it's small 262mm front discs and 1300kg of mass, approx. 140bhp, this is a good sign. This setup is a bit under-disked at the front compared to many, and I have had fade problems with previous pads - old Black Diamond Perdators and Halfrauds ones (really awful pad).
More plus points are that the Yellowstuff do not grab at all, I have not had ABS activate in a big way since having them fitted (apart from on snow), only the odd moment when braking hard-ish while driving over a very rough surface. The pads want to haul the car down from speed in an efficient, predictable and fuss free manner, even when pressing on. I think the coefficient of friction could be a touch higher for my car, as it is under-servoed compared to many, but they are not seriously lacking at all, unlike the old Halfrauds pads fitted when I bought the car.
Based on my experience with them, I am fairly confident they would be good enough for a few track days laps at a time, hopefully I will get to test that out soon.
So overall I rate them at 8/10 for my car and my driving style - town driving mainly, some higher speed stuff, with the occasional mildly enthusiastic drive, on a car with small discs fitted for its weight and power, which demands a decent pad as a result, and they would probably work well on track.
Edited by Turkey on Saturday 30th April 17:56
I was recommended the Yellowstuff by Andy at EBC. At the time I told him that the car has small discs for the wieght/power, and will be used a bit entusiastically on the road from time to time, and that I hoped to do a trackday.
I think he recommended the right pad from their range to be honest based on my experience with them.
Do EBC not say Yellowstuff can be used on the road though, I thought they were ECE approved now in many applications?
I am not sure where the 19,000 miles comes from, but I guess I will get 20-30,000 miles from the Yellowstuff on the front, obviously that would be a long race, but in race conditions the pads will wear a LOT quicker so my road use cannot suggest that the pads would last for thousands of miles in track conditions.
I think he recommended the right pad from their range to be honest based on my experience with them.
Do EBC not say Yellowstuff can be used on the road though, I thought they were ECE approved now in many applications?
I am not sure where the 19,000 miles comes from, but I guess I will get 20-30,000 miles from the Yellowstuff on the front, obviously that would be a long race, but in race conditions the pads will wear a LOT quicker so my road use cannot suggest that the pads would last for thousands of miles in track conditions.
Edited by Turkey on Saturday 30th April 18:42
Update on my Bluestuff NDX pads. I've now been running these for about 300 miles.
Compared to the Brembo pads, they offer better initial bight, better modulation, and better braking performance - up to a point, which I'll discuss. However, when they fade, they do so in the most unsafe fashion - working fine and then "oh jesus I'm going to hit a wall" type fade.
It's interesting because there is a big debate going on about these pads on the MLR. There are a couple of TA cars running these pads which are having no problems but quite a few road cars that are reporting fade. I suspect some of these reports though are green fade.
I do wonder whether the nature of track driving is suiting these pads better, i.e. very hard braking but a reasonable cool down time between applications of the brakes; they advertised as track pads after-all.
On a twisty B road driven like a tarmac stage, the brakes are getting more frequent applications, and a combination of soft and hard stops, and just don't get a chance to cool down at all. Hit a straight section of road for 10-15 seconds and performance quickly comes back, but it's the unpredictability that worries me.
Mine should be bedded in now, and I'm still getting fade. Will I buy them again? At the moment no; they're ok for brisk driving, but the rapid onset of fade is not suited to a fast road car.
I'll update again when I've put some more miles on them.
Compared to the Brembo pads, they offer better initial bight, better modulation, and better braking performance - up to a point, which I'll discuss. However, when they fade, they do so in the most unsafe fashion - working fine and then "oh jesus I'm going to hit a wall" type fade.
It's interesting because there is a big debate going on about these pads on the MLR. There are a couple of TA cars running these pads which are having no problems but quite a few road cars that are reporting fade. I suspect some of these reports though are green fade.
I do wonder whether the nature of track driving is suiting these pads better, i.e. very hard braking but a reasonable cool down time between applications of the brakes; they advertised as track pads after-all.
On a twisty B road driven like a tarmac stage, the brakes are getting more frequent applications, and a combination of soft and hard stops, and just don't get a chance to cool down at all. Hit a straight section of road for 10-15 seconds and performance quickly comes back, but it's the unpredictability that worries me.
Mine should be bedded in now, and I'm still getting fade. Will I buy them again? At the moment no; they're ok for brisk driving, but the rapid onset of fade is not suited to a fast road car.
I'll update again when I've put some more miles on them.
Turkey said:
So on the rear, the Yellowstuff seem require more heat than my setup can provide to work reliably, and I will not use them again on the rear brakes. I will consider Greenstuff in the future though.
Exact same thing I found on my Mondeo. The Mk3 Mondeo has reasonably big rear discs (280mm), so probably even harder to get heat in to them. I went back to Apec pads.Late last year I read a forum response (not PH) from the 'boss' of EBC where he threw a massive hissy fit at forum members for berating the quality of his products based upon historic experiences. He went on to say that the entire range had received a massive amount of R&D and were now nothing like the EBC of old.
I wish I could find that thread/post now, as I'd be keen to share my experience.
I upgraded the brakes on my track E36 over the winter and decided to trust in this chap's word. He was clearly very passionate about the effort his company had put into creating a quality product. A lot of people seem to recommend one type of disc and another type of pad but, I thought, surely there can be no better pairing than having both form the same supplier. Bcause, surely, they will have extensively tested their products on a 'whole system' basis.
So I put EBC grooved discs and Yellowstuff pads on.
Early afternoon yesterday, the car's second track day since the refit, my son starts complaining about lack of brakes as he arrives at some of the corners.
First, a visual check of the pads through the wheels. Seems to be plenty of meat left. Then a check of the fluid; it's hot but not overly. Sent him back out.
Still happening so I tell him to watch his driving; that maybe his heel'n'toeing is resulting in him not hitting the brake pedal properly. He confirms that he's pretty sure he's not mis-pressing the pedal.
Come the end of the day, we get the track wheels off for the road wheels to go back on. A closer look at the pads and they look like sponges. A little tap with the end of a screwdriver and they start to crumble away. 300 track miles and they're shot.
That's pretty crap.
So I won't be using them again. And on the basis of historic opinion plus contemporary experience, I don't think that adding the term 'ever' would be too far out either.
I wish I could find that thread/post now, as I'd be keen to share my experience.
I upgraded the brakes on my track E36 over the winter and decided to trust in this chap's word. He was clearly very passionate about the effort his company had put into creating a quality product. A lot of people seem to recommend one type of disc and another type of pad but, I thought, surely there can be no better pairing than having both form the same supplier. Bcause, surely, they will have extensively tested their products on a 'whole system' basis.
So I put EBC grooved discs and Yellowstuff pads on.
Early afternoon yesterday, the car's second track day since the refit, my son starts complaining about lack of brakes as he arrives at some of the corners.
First, a visual check of the pads through the wheels. Seems to be plenty of meat left. Then a check of the fluid; it's hot but not overly. Sent him back out.
Still happening so I tell him to watch his driving; that maybe his heel'n'toeing is resulting in him not hitting the brake pedal properly. He confirms that he's pretty sure he's not mis-pressing the pedal.
Come the end of the day, we get the track wheels off for the road wheels to go back on. A closer look at the pads and they look like sponges. A little tap with the end of a screwdriver and they start to crumble away. 300 track miles and they're shot.
That's pretty crap.
So I won't be using them again. And on the basis of historic opinion plus contemporary experience, I don't think that adding the term 'ever' would be too far out either.
V8Mate, don;t the Yellows need 1500 miles of normal driving to bed-in? I'm sure that's what I did when I had them on my Z3MCoupe. Bedded them in and did a full day at Snetterton. They were still fine two yeras later. For reference the discs were BMW OEM discs.
I'm never too sure about this grooved-disc design, I can see that putting extra vibration into the pad under pressure and potentially damaging the edges of the pad material. Is there a single OEM who fit a grooved disc to their car, even the high performance variants? If not, ask yourself why not.
I'm never too sure about this grooved-disc design, I can see that putting extra vibration into the pad under pressure and potentially damaging the edges of the pad material. Is there a single OEM who fit a grooved disc to their car, even the high performance variants? If not, ask yourself why not.
DavidCane said:
V8Mate, don;t the Yellows need 1500 miles of normal driving to bed-in? I'm sure that's what I did when I had them on my Z3MCoupe. Bedded them in and did a full day at Snetterton. They were still fine two yeras later. For reference the discs were BMW OEM discs.
I'm never too sure about this grooved-disc design, I can see that putting extra vibration into the pad under pressure and potentially damaging the edges of the pad material. Is there a single OEM who fit a grooved disc to their car, even the high performance variants? If not, ask yourself why not.
Because Joe public take the car back claiming that the brakes are too noisy or sound 'grumbly' under hard use. That would be my guess rather than performance issues.I'm never too sure about this grooved-disc design, I can see that putting extra vibration into the pad under pressure and potentially damaging the edges of the pad material. Is there a single OEM who fit a grooved disc to their car, even the high performance variants? If not, ask yourself why not.
In my experience, grooved discs actually fill up with brake material so are not such a great aid as claimed. Having said that, I have had them but can't say whether they improve things as I changed to a kore aggressive pad at the same time so the brakes were certainly better but maybe not for that reason.
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