Motorway Heart attack !!
Discussion
I was going down the motorway the other day traveling from Stoke to Bournemouth. The roads were pretty empty the whole way so I never really used my brakes. Anyway, it had been chucking it down with rain for a while and at one point the traffic in front decided to stop quickly so I put the brakes on and nothing happened !!!!!!!!
I instantly thought that they must be firstly full of water and very cold. I was very lucky not to hit the car in front, traveling at about 70, there was just no power in the brakes no matter how hard I pressed on the pedal. Even with drilled disks, I expect the water to get out a bit faster. so moral of the story, make sure you try the brakes often on a long journey !
I instantly thought that they must be firstly full of water and very cold. I was very lucky not to hit the car in front, traveling at about 70, there was just no power in the brakes no matter how hard I pressed on the pedal. Even with drilled disks, I expect the water to get out a bit faster. so moral of the story, make sure you try the brakes often on a long journey !
What pads are you using? Many 'competition' brake pads are absolutely lethal when flat cold and as such need extreme care when running on cold, wet motorway trips where you can go for miles without touching the brakes.
In the dry, you are usually ok unless the pads are quite extreme, since just the pad skimming the disc will keep enough heat in them, but with water cooling from motorway spray it can be a different story.
You could try to get into the habit of 'check' braking every so often, but to be honest I just avoid motorways in those conditions!
In the dry, you are usually ok unless the pads are quite extreme, since just the pad skimming the disc will keep enough heat in them, but with water cooling from motorway spray it can be a different story.
You could try to get into the habit of 'check' braking every so often, but to be honest I just avoid motorways in those conditions!
I understand some stories here, bit still strange, they should brake a bit at least?!
when did you change brake fluid then? maybe a lot of moistre sits in your system as well...what kind of brake fluid and type do you use...??? and when was your last change? and what pads are you using.
At least your haert is pumping again
but scary, yep!
GTRene
when did you change brake fluid then? maybe a lot of moistre sits in your system as well...what kind of brake fluid and type do you use...??? and when was your last change? and what pads are you using.
At least your haert is pumping again
but scary, yep! GTRene
I had a similar experience after a very early morning start and then a cold damp drive of a hundred miles or so without touching the brakes at all and then a bit of splashing through puddles just before the end. I nearly bent the pedal in half trying to stop the car from walking pace, after a couple of seconds the brakes started working again. Drove a hundred yards with my foot on the brakes and they were back to normal after that. I think the pads must have glazed over or something. I was running Tarox XF at the time, they're fast road rather than race pads and I haven't had any other trouble with them.
The pads I use are Mintes 1144 all round. The brake fluid was changed about a year ago, I'm flushing the system tomorow and putting new fluid in. The pedal stayed hard whilst pressing on it at the time. The braking power didnt get back to normal until I gave them a good hammering after that. I was just so shocked that it took so long to get anything out of them. It really had been raining a lot and I had been on the motorways for about 3 hours so the brakes must have been very wet and stone cold. I will have to trade it in and get a nice S2 exige with power assisted brakes !
somethimes when you wash your car, and also do the wheels some of those products can come on the wheels! that can be scary too, I had that once, and ever since fierts thing I do is when I drive out the washbox one foot on the brakes(not that hard) and other on the accelerator! that way in about 100 or 200meters their OK again(with normal brakes)
Never forget that after a cool
fast lift of out the wasbox where some guys looked at my car, but it was a short straight and then a full 90 left, bud my brakes where not the same as normal after the wasbox
so it was a bit very fast 90 left, but I managed...just, so beware of your brakes with some cleaning stuf out of the wasbox!
GTRene
Never forget that after a cool
fast lift of out the wasbox where some guys looked at my car, but it was a short straight and then a full 90 left, bud my brakes where not the same as normal after the wasbox so it was a bit very fast 90 left, but I managed...just, so beware of your brakes with some cleaning stuf out of the wasbox! GTRene
piooly said:
The pads I use are Mintex 1144 all round. The brake fluid was changed about a year ago, I'm flushing the system tomorrow and putting new fluid in. The pedal stayed hard whilst pressing on it at the time. The braking power didnt get back to normal until I gave them a good hammering after that. I was just so shocked that it took so long to get anything out of them. It really had been raining a lot and I had been on the motorways for about 3 hours so the brakes must have been very wet and stone cold. I will have to trade it in and get a nice S2 exige with power assisted brakes !
Nothing to do with the brake fluid! Simply that fast road or competition spec. brakes are have compounds which are more effective when they are really being worked, but much worse than standard pads when they are cold...it's the price you pay for having pads which don't fade on a race circuit and is simpy down to the pad temperature and wet discs. Effectively, the heat energy generated by the brakes is absorbed by boiling off any water on the brakes before it can start to get the pads up to working temperature and hard pads don't start to work properly until they have a reasonable amount of heat in them.
If you do a lot of all-weather, moderate speed driving (particularly motorway stuff), consider fitting a standard set of pads most of the time and just keep your Mintex pads to swap in when you do track days.
Lotus and the brake manufacturers will have spent a lot of time and trouble optimising the standard pads for road use...competition/fast road pads will be better on the track but will be a less-than-perfect compromise for general road use.
Sam_68 said:
Nothing to do with the brake fluid! Simply that fast road or competition spec. brakes are have compounds which are more effective when they are really being worked, but much worse than standard pads when they are cold...
More to do with the fact that Mintex 1144s are very good at soaking up water and take longer to dry out than some other competition compound pads. When dry, 1144s bite very well from cold so that is not really the problem.
Dan
Jude Performance Services Ltd
Gassing Station | Elise/Exige/Europa/340R | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff