November 24, 2017
I found this article from Road & Track a while back and I’ve been meaning to share it because I’ve had to deal with both things: brake failure and hitting the wall. The article has some pretty good tips that I won’t bother copying here, it’s a quick read so just head over to their site.
The time I hit the wall was not because of brake failure, I lost it on a wet track and was not able to regain control. In my case, I didn’t have the chance to control how I hit the wall, I just went in sideways at around 65 MPH. Having experienced that, I think the article offers some good information for such a situation.
As for brake failure, I’ve been dealing with it on the BRZ as I push the car to go faster. I’m using HAWK DTC-60 pads which work great but the rotors are getting too hot, so I’ve boiled the fluid about 4 times. The last time it happened was at Sebring, last session of the last day. It was the only session I had open track and I was determined to get the most out of it. I ended up going 2 off because the pedal kept getting longer and longer and I wasn’t able to slow down enough going into turn 16, I ended my session after that.
One of the last upgrades I did was installing brake cooling ducts. Haven’t had the chance to test them but I’ve been told they should allow enough flow to keep the temperatures under control.
