Let me clarify and hopefully step this down to more civil tone.

Okay. One place I'm losing you is the intended application. I mentioned drag racing because you only stop once and have a lot of time to do so, so using a very low weight braking system is perfectly okay. But where the confusion for me comes in this that you say the rotor is designed to reduce unsprung weight with the implication that it will improve handling. My point is for getting around road course, or even cruising down a nice twisty mountain road, braking, not only the first time but the 129th time, is where most passes occur and where most of the time is gained or lost. So why would I want to spend money on a rotor that works only as well as the stock rotor the first time, then progressively worse as it becomes heat soaked? My question is, is the real point of the rotor for looks?


Or that the COF between the pad and the steel rotor is less then the COF between the pad and the iron rotor. Lap times and braking points would be the indicator here. But didn't just say the steel rotor does NOT have the same heat holding capacity as an iron rotor and will become heat soaked faster? Which is it?

That helps. Oval cars have much different braking needs then a street car or a car that sees road course track time.

[QUOTE][B]
How

 

I should have clarified. I never quite put parking lots, drag strips, or ovals into the same category as "real" tracks with left and right turns. Okay, okay, that's a bit of a snobish point of view... Sorry!

I think part of the misunderstanding here is that SomeOtherGuy seems to have just caught the tail end of the brake upgrade project and maybe doesn't realize that the wave rotor was kind of a secondary offshoot of the original goal.

Correct me if I'm wrong guys, but isn't your main product here the complete front brake kit with the cast iron rotors? The wave rotors seem like a very specialized use, low volume product that won't appeal to as many people.

 

As a person that admires the S2000 for the no-holds-barred, pure sportscar, minimalist approach that Honda took in building it, I shudder at the idea of spending money on it to reduce its effectiveness as an implement of speed. . . whether on a twisty mountain road or a road course. These cars were built to turn fast, brake hard, and rev to the sky, all with consummate driver control. . . this is a mod gone wrong.

OK, maybe you can throw these steel brakeman rotors on a midget dirt track car. Fine. But on an S2000, a car destined for tearing up canyon roads on sticky street tires and the track on R comps, under high traction conditions (unlike a midget car on a dirt track), no way.

As to the argument that the rotors will work just fine for some people. . . well, aquatreads would work fine for some people, but you sure as heck wouldn't find performance enthusiasts like me throwing them on.

Just my $0.02.

Jeff

 

Frankly, we did this to please ourselves. James and I love the performance and feel of these rotors, and we don't give a hoot what everybody else thinks. If I worried what other people thought of me, I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning

There is no compromise in the braking of this car on the road in any way, and the braking performance is better than stock. Period.

We have them working on our cars. All anyone else has is an opinion.

 

Rick, I'm not attacking you personally. Indeed I admire your passion.

You cite a performance improvement on the street. Are you sure you are not getting better performance due to a change in some other component? For example, SS lines, fresh brake fluid, new pads, differnent compound pads, better clamping force from new caliper?

I think that only from a back-to-back test with 'conventional' iron rotors and wavy rotors (both properly seasoned) could one draw the conclusion that the wavy rotors work better.

 

I would like to see a back to back comparison also with the following ingredients:

1. 2 S2000's. One w/ the wave rotors and one w/ the stock rotors
2. One driver for both cars
3. Pyrometer
4. Data acquisition system such as Pi or Stack
OR
4. Stopwatch and a g-force potentiometer
5. If no potentiometer, than just a stopwatch to record lap times and segment times at braking zones.

The driver should drive each car about 10 laps a session.
Every lap should be timed.
Stopping force should be measured by way of data acquisition or potentiometer.
Rotor temperatures should be recorded after each session.
The results of this would provide empirical data as to which rotors work best. If I was a betting man, I would bet on the stock cast irons, but I'd keep my mind open.

 

Hey, if anyone wants to downgrade your brakes with flower shaped rotors be my guest, just make sure that people understand that they are a *downgrade* in performance. Saying that they are better around town just confuses things. "Street performance" is a myth, if they're worse on the track they're worse on the street.

 

Hey Rick-

Do you notice an improvement in ride fell and road holding because of the loss of unsprung weight?

 

Brakes How They Work .

1 The tires stop the car
2 The brakes resist turning of wheels
3 The calipers clamp rotors
4 The brake petal moves piston in master cylinder to produce pressure in brake lines to move pistons in caliper .

To stop a car from 60 mph the motion of the car is converted in to heat in the rotors .
A 6,000 lb car will generate more heat than a 3,000 lb car.
When a brake system is designed , you want the front brakes to lock up before the rear brakes , so the driver does not lose control . ( under certain racing conditions you might want the rears to lock up first )
Lets take a car up to 60 mph and apply the brakes hard . The weight of the car will move forward , rotating this weight movement ,over the center of gravity of the car ,putting more weight on the front wheels , increasing the friction between the front tires and the road , reducing the weight on the rear tires.. This is why you have increased front braking capabilities designed into most automobiles .
I bought a S-2000 in April of 2000 . I loved the car , but I was not impressed with the brakes . I thought I would just go out and purchase a aftermarket set of brakes , Brembo , Porsche , AP Racing or Mugen . At the time no one had a set of brakes for the car .I kept looking and found that Spoon, was selling a set of Nissin calipers ( private labeled with the Spoon name) that were made for the S-2000 but I would have to buy Spoon wheels or use spacers with my stock wheels , to fit . The next company that I checked was Project Mu , same problem as Spoon they would not fit stock wheels . So I kept looking , during this search I came across this site . http://www.advancedcooling.com ( This should answer some of your questions ,"SomeOtherGuy") Well as you go to this site ,you will find out how Brake Man and I got together . I called and we talked brakes for about 2 hours on the phone that first time. I still had a long way to go .
At this point I wrote down a set of goals , for what I wanted for the brake system on my car .
1 It had to fit in stock wheels
2 It had to improve performance

This was a start , there are some definite limitations to modifying the braking systems on a modern sports car . master cylinder size , wheel size ( room for components ) ABS compatibility and overall braking bias of the car .

Warren ( The Brake Man ) was just starting production of the F-3 caliper . It is a reduced dimension clone of his F-4 and F-5 racing caliper . ( Used on racing Vipers and Corvettes ) So what was so special about the F-3 caliper , it is a forged aluminum caliper designed for reduced flex . Why would you worry about flex , ( better petal modulation , more efficient use of limited brake fluid ) This would let us install 1.75" pistons without reducing petal height . Warren ,Nickel plates the F-3 caliper inside and out to improve the corrosion resistive properties of the aluminum parts ( I guess that he must be crazy ,because only the colors red or blue or black will make a car stop) We checked the fitment of the F-3 caliper on the S-2000 and we built an adapter bracket to mount it . We also designed the forged aluminum hat to hold 12.19 directional curved vane racing rotor ( thermally treated of course ) We also designed a custom residual valve and we worked with a small company ( Earl's) to produce brake lines for the stock brake system and our big brake kit .
We did some thing real dumb, we tested the kit on a car for 8,000 miles , we took this same car , with this new fangled front brakes to the race track . ( Nelson Ledges Race Track in Ohio ) We tested the brakes with the new front system and the stock rear system . ( we tested on street tires ,no R-1 tires ) We test with brake rotor temperature paint ( made by Tempilaq) and a high temperature infrared thermometer. What was I looking for as I drove the car ? how far could I go into the corners and still be able to control car , would the front end push under real hard braking , would the rear step out under hard braking or tail braking, would the brakes fade after 10 to 15 laps at speed . ( ps the slots were not in the front rotors) We found out that the brake could be modulated with complete control ( no ABS kicking in) we could drive farther in to the turns , than a Porsche Boxer S on R-1 rubber ) The car was driving OK but what about rotor temperatures . We found that the rear one piece cast iron rotor was running in a temperature range , that would allow us to look at the possibility of designing a Ultra Light Weight Rotor , based on Brake Man's "Revolution " rotor . This rotor is mainly used for Sprint cars they mount one of these rotors on the rear live axle of the car and have one caliper and rotor on one front wheel .
The front kit we designed removed 18lbs of unsprung weight , and we were interested in reducing things further . The Ultra light rear rotor removes almost 8 more pounds . This entire project has been designed with performance , always being the driving force . The shape of the rear rotor is really a "No-Brainer" remove as much material as possible and still get the rotor to sweep entire pad . ( most racing motor cycles use some type of reduced weight rotor ) but why put something that works on a motor cycle on a car ? ( Why not if it works) For people that don't understand how the reduced area under the pad works. As you put 1,000 psi on the back of the brake pad and you have a pad with 2 square inches surface area , this 1000 psi is spread out over 2 sq inches.If you reduce the surface area of the pad hitting the rotor the amount of pressure between the pad material and the rotor increases because of this lack of area . What is the down side , increased pad wear ( about 10%) and a increase in pad temperature .

So we decided to sell brake kits . We added slots to get the LOOK . ( maybe we should have drilled holes in the cast iron rotor so we could reduce the structural integrity of the rotor under hard use) We first showed a drawing of the Ultra light weight rotor and we received all the " why does it look like that?" " it looks like a flower ." " it won't work "
As we market this kit what are people drawn to? , the rear rotor . We designed it for one use , performance , it fits the rear braking requirements for the S-2000 on the race track ( one car using this setup is SC'ed and running Motion suspension and R-1 tires , and no stickers and real fast times )
Any time you reduce the weight in a race car , you will improve its performance ..The kit that we sell is designed for track use , will it work on the street , no problem .
The rotors on the front of Rick's and James's cars will operate on the street with no problems . The steel wear surface will last longer than our thermally treated cast iron rotors . As I would drive my car on the street with the race set up , they actually have a system closer matched to the way the car is used , with a maximum reduction in weight . The amount of stopping force is the same for both systems.

All of the parts that we sell are racing parts designed for certain types of racing . The front rotor is the same rotor that will make 25 to 50 laps in a 750 HP sprint car .

The goal of any open minded person is to look outside the box and drive out side the lines .

Producing the best performing Honda S-2000 brake system is our goal . We have looked at every item that we can modify , to improve the ability of the driver to better control the brakes on their car , for the required application.

For a more complete understanding of our brake system go to :
http://www.ricks2k.com/products/brakes.html

I hope all the heat from this post warms the weather here in Ohio.

brad

Ps
If you need more reading , put caliper , rotor , brake pads , big brake kit, in to the search engine and spend the some time reading about a lot of dead horses .

 

whoa, that's a lot of reading. I'd still be interested in seeing the back to back test I mentioned before. I would be a willing donor if you guys happened to be in CA. Laguna Seca would be the best for the test.