better rear brakes

[JShadzi at aol.com]

Brett, with all due respect, when this email hit my inbox my "strictly-stock-Audi-part-grumpy-old-man email alarm" went to full alert..comments inserted below...

> Track driving and "hard" street driving are not even close to
> comparison.  How many times, in hard street driving, do you go from 100 to 50, in the space of a few of minutes?  In one weekend you can easily go through half your pads at Watkins Glen, for example.  If cars don't have at least half their pad material, they get a stern warning to check them after every >rungroup.

Yes, absolutely agreed with the above

> >i did have drilled rotors
>
> Drilled rotors are mostly useless.  Even the Porsche ones(which, it turns out, Porsche lied about- they are NOT cast, they really ARE
> drilled).  Show me a drilled or slotted rotor, I'll show you an overpriced, structurally weakened rotor with less thermal mass and less contact area that is going to be full of brake pad material and rust in a few weeks anyway.
>

Ok, while its true that removing material from a rotor does reduce its thermal capacity, if the drilling created better airflow and venting of gases, then the thermal effect can be offset.  Regardless, I use slotted rotors in the front of my car, the slots don't fill with rust or brake pad material btw, if fact I'm always amazed that they don't.  Anyway, this isnt' a hill to die on, there aren't very many cars crashing due to brake failure from drilled rotors, for the most part (99.999%)the rotor will wear way before any cracking can cause a failure.

> I've seen the evidence first-hand; a qclub instructor tried all sorts
> of things on his 90q20v, including slotted rotors and drilled rotors.
> They came off the car looking like a disaster- stress cracks, slots
> full of brake pad material+rust...you know what he did?  Did the G60
> upgrade(I believe) and solid rotors.

Right, thanks for the hard data..  ;)  So the G60 is the ultimate fail safe upgrade, eh?  Hmm, that's news to me..if anything makes a better paper holder than a stress cracked drilled rotor its a G60 caliper IMO.

> >ss lines
>
> Not only worthless, but dangerous.  Stainless Steel lines have ABSOLUTELY NO BUSINESS (other over-zealous statements snipped...)
>

Ok, your comments may be true for plain old steel lines wrt dirt contamination, etc, but DOT approved stainless lines are superior to rubber in every way.  They have molded stress reliefs at each fitting and are coated with rubber or plastic to protect the teflon liner from contamination.  Oh ya, they don't fail, ever, assuming they're installed properly in the right application.  Every year in the US there are probably a couple hundred thousand DOT approved stainless line sets sold in the us, the failure rate is statistically zero, I think you're over stepping yourself with your statements...


>mintex pads
>
> Can't comment on aftermarket pads, only to say I'm quite happy with
> my stock(ATE?) pads on my UFO-equipped 200q20v.  I have heard the
> mintex name frequently- I think someone on the 200q20v list runs them
> on his G60-equipped 200q20v when he does track events.
>
> Careful who you buy from- someone bought pads from APR for his
> S4(they cost a FORTUNE, too), lasted ONE on-track session at Watkins
> Glen before he was back in the garage pulling off the wheels and
> cursing, because the pads completely glazed over the rotors.  Hate to
> be the guy at APR who had to answer that phone call.

Yes, I've been on the ohter end of that phone myself, its important to do your research before you call up your local tuner and buy whatever they sell you based on the information you've given them.  Its clear that the pad was used in the wrong application, its not as easy as just blaming APR or the pads.

Mintex makes a stock replacement RedBox pad, its an excellent low dust street pad, nuff said.  Regardless, if you're limiting yourself to stock replacement ATE pads, your missing out on some good brake pads out there.

Javad