Street brake pads that would handle light track day WRX?

Have a friend thats looking into starting track days.

He has a newish (2013-2015) WRX (stock, daily driver) running 300+ treadwear summer tires.

Needs new brakes before the summer anyway so looking for something that doesn't screech on the street like my Carbotech XP 10/12 do but are decent on track.

VIR is closest track so three sections per lap of hard braking from tripple digits into second gear turns. Four 25 min sessions in beginner per day.

Heard Hawk HPS and HP+ as well as Porterfield R4S are quite on the street but are more autocross pads and while they may or may not be fine for his first track day they probably wont be good for his second or third day.

Any suggestions for a pad livable on the street that wont glaze on the track if he keeps it at or under 8/10ths?

My experience with Hawk HP+ on my Legacy is that they are really loud on the street. The bite is great and they can handle the heat of our track on my car but if he wants quiet then he should look to something else.

Adam

I ran Stoptech Street Performance pads for dual-duty like that and they were great other than dusting a lot. That was on an E46 330 which has pretty big factory brakes though, so YMMV.

I didn't find the HP+ pads noisy on my ZX2SR but they needed heat. The first cold application could be unsettling until you got used to it, not a problem on track.

I also used HPS pads with good results, The HP+ had more bight.

A lot of pad life depends on how the driver uses the brakes.

My first thought was R4S. I've run them on track with a turbo Miata. The only ones I've ever glazed weren't properly bedded in the first place.

They're more heat resistant than the HP+ in my experience.

Dusty would be the biggest drawback that I've experienced with the hawks. Worth the fortune I spend in wheel acid imho.

I threw a set of NIB HP Plus pads on my Crown Vic last year. They've been pretty damn good, although they do squeal at low temps and produce quite a bit of dust when installed on a 3800-lb car. Even properly bedded in, they do wear quicker than I was anticipating (although that's probably due to my dumb commute). They did help quite a bit in autocross, as I sometimes had slight fade after 5 or so runs on the stock pads, and that fade sometimes got worse on the drive home. I figure I'll try EBC Yellowstuff later this year, as my friend has noticed great improvements over stock semi-mets without much more dust on his P71.

HP+ have been great in beginner and intermediate on my RX-8. They are terrible on the street. They stop great, but squeal when cold, dust like crazy, and the dust is corrosive. If he is planning on doing more than 1 event, I would recommend getting a second set of pads and rotors to swap on for track days. You already have to pull them to inspect before hand, doesn't take any more time to swap to a dedicated track pad.

Don't forget to change the brake fluid before the event. I see more beginners boiling old fluid than glazing pads.

tomtomgt356 wrote: Don't forget to change the brake fluid before the event. I see more beginners boiling old fluid than glazing pads.

This is more or less the big one. Even though sliding about doesn't usually put a whole lot of stress on your brake fluid, I typically change it first when I buy the car, and then at one year intervals from that simply because I do end up hammering on it a fair bit. If I were participating in track days, I'd do it before every event.

EBC YellowStuff isn't bad for mixed street/track use. Not the best track pads, but not any worse than HP+ and the like. They dust quite a bit (not more than the stock pads on a BMW) but they're pretty quiet. Cheap, too.

On my E46 M3 I ran Performance Friction PFC-01 pads on the track and those pesky street miles in between. They were way more street friendly than the Pagid Blacks and way better on the track than the Hawks.

tomtomgt356 wrote: Don't forget to change the brake fluid before the event. I see more beginners boiling old fluid than glazing pads.

Already plan to have him over to my garage to switch to ATE type 200.

Keith Tanner wrote: My first thought was R4S. I've run them on track with a turbo Miata. The only ones I've ever glazed weren't properly bedded in the first place. They're more heat resistant than the HP+ in my experience.

How are they on the street with noise?

I always liked Porterfield but I never cared about street use. The other one I liked was cool carbon but I don't think they are made anymore.

I've been using Performance Friction pads for the last couple of years on my street/track Fairmont. I'm notorious for not using brakes properly, but they've been holding up well and doing the job surprisingly well.

R4S pads are fantastic! They're really dusty, but they're quiet and they never gave up on my notoriously under-braked B13 SE-R.

Fr3AkAzOiD wrote:

tomtomgt356 wrote: Don't forget to change the brake fluid before the event. I see more beginners boiling old fluid than glazing pads.

Already plan to have him over to my garage to switch to ATE type 200.

Keith Tanner wrote: My first thought was R4S. I've run them on track with a turbo Miata. The only ones I've ever glazed weren't properly bedded in the first place. They're more heat resistant than the HP+ in my experience.

How are they on the street with noise?

None to speak of. The only downside to street use is a lack of immediate bite when it's cold (below freezing) outside. I've run them on street cars for years.

snailmont5oh wrote: I've been using Performance Friction pads for the last couple of years on my street/track Fairmont. I'm notorious for not using brakes properly, but they've been holding up well and doing the job surprisingly well.

I used PFC97 pads on the Targa Miata when it was doing rally with both the four and the V8 They'd always stop the car - cold, hot, wet, whatever. They just WORKED.

However, if they were outside their normal operating temperature range, they would destroy the rotors. I usually used two sets of rotors for every set of pads, as I was apparently always too hot or too cold. But they always stopped.

In reply to Keith Tanner:

I don't even know what compound my pads are. All I really know is that they're for a Lincoln MkVII, on NAPA Mustang rotors, in a 3200# Fairmont, and I don't brake late enough. They work well on the street, except for the first two stops, and my rotors seem fairly happy at this time.

Here's something that I just remembered; last July at Summit Point Shenandoah, I was having way too much fun helping a guy in a C-4 make mistakes, and at the end of the session, the brakes seemed to be kinda stuck on. I actually left the property and drove up the road slowly to try to cool them, but they stayed stuck for a bit after I parked the car. I always move the car a little every 30 seconds or so to try to not break the rotors, so there was no big catastrophe, but what do you think was behind that? [/hijack]

A misadjusted brake pedal can do that. There's a return hole in the master that allows for fluid expansion with heat. If the master doesn't have enough free play, then this hole is blocked. The fluid has nowhere to go when it gets hot, so it starts to push on the pistons. If it gets far enough, you can lock all four wheels.

Ooh...I'll have to check that, since I had to modify stuff to get that huge master cylinder in there. I might have to make a spacer fior the master cylinder mounting flange.

Dunno about your specific application, but EBC Yellowstuff is fantastic. The Esprit (RIP) went from like 3 stops from 100 and then no brakes at all with stock (Toyota) pads to never having another heat soak problem with Yellowstuff, including track days with 15 minutes on the track per session and glowing rotors.

If you want low dust, the ceramic pads like the EBC Red are very good, assuming that the heat range fits into your car weight/enthusiasm quotient. I run the Red on the street Solstice, which I do not track, but do drive hard on occasion (GM stock pads seem to be determined by how much use an 80 year old nanny will need). They eliminate that brief but offputting 'oh shzt' moment before the stock pads grab when you suddenly need to lay into them hard - much prompter initial grab.

My BMW Z4M is getting Porterfield R4S because I wanted to check out that compound having used the R4 race compound for years on the track.

Stoptech rates the Sport Pad (formerly named Street Performance Pad) with a temperature range of 200F to 900F. Quiet, butter smooth, relatively easy on the rotors if you keep the transfer layer refreshed. Only down side is the dust, but it's non-corrosive and washes off easily no matter how long you wait to wash it.

I don't know what they're like on the street, but Performance Friction Carbon 92 were a big advantage on the LeMons car, on a short track with otherwise stock brakes

I run EBC Yellowstuff on my Corolla. More civilized than cheap metallics (only a little screeching when stone cold, after the first couple stops they're quiet) and they're VERY sharp and shrug off any heat I can put into them with the AE92. If there's a problem with these pads it's that they're too easy to lock up the wheels with - pro drifters often run these in their separate hydraulic handbrake calipers because of how sharp they are.

Now a WRX is a good 50% heavier than my Corolla but I still think these could be the perfect answer. The compound is more aggressive than what he has now, and anything more aggressive than these is going to be an all-out race pad.