For those that have changed their brake pads already, which one do you recommend if you changed from the OEM pads. I think the brakes in this car are pretty weak. They bite less than the ones on my old '91 celica even. With my celica, I barely have to step on them before they start biting hard and slow the car down. Right now I don't wanna spend the big bucks on the full rotor/brake kits.


Would changing to steel braided brake lines help??


Edit: Oops, posted to Car Talk. Can a mod please move to S2K talk?

 

First of all the brakes on the S2000, even the stock pads stop much better then the crappy pads you had on a 91 celica. The reason they don't seem to stop as hard is the tires on the S2000 can take a lot more clamping force before they are overcome by the friction forces from the pads on the rotors. In other words you gotta push em harder to overcome the stickiness of the tires.

You will find with high temp racing pads that for street driving you have even less bite and once you get them hot they will overpower your stock tires easily and you will lock your tires up easier and they are much "touchier."

I have no idea what you would be trying to accomplish with a big brake kit. That is for shedding heat that is built up from running hard with R-compounds not running cold on the street. This will make it harder for you to heat up your pads resulting in less bite.

The street pads for the S2000 give a good amount of bite at low temps which is what you need for the street. Stainless steel lines will make the pedal feel less spongy because they don't expand, but will result in little to no stopping distance changes on the street. They can be much more of a service nightmare and give you nothing over rubber lines on the street.

I am sure you can find some lower temp pads that will bite harder at lower temps if that is what you need, but this will come at the expense of losing high temp braking.

 

Moving to S2000 Talk.

 

So what you're saying is the crappy pads in my celica perform better because the clamping force on it is greater than the spinning force of the rotating wheels??? Wouldn't that imply they're NOT crappy? I just know that the brakes on it start to clamp down hard (and decelerate the car fast) without much brake pedal travel. I like to achieve the same result. I feel like I have to double the pedal force to get the same braking in the S2k.

It sounds like I have some compromising to do if when it comes to high and low temp brake preferences.

 

Feelings can be deceptive. Try some full ABS panic stops from 40-50 mph (where and when it is safe to do so, of course). Just jam on the brakes as hard as you can. (Put the clutch in, so you don't stall.) Do it a couple times. That will teach you how hard you have to push down to get the full benefit of the brakes. My guess is that you were never braking as hard as you could with your Celica.

And yes, track pads have higher coefficients of fiction when the brakes are hot, but they have much lower coefficients of friction when the brakes are cold. Most track pads actually require you to push down harder in a street situation than a street pad would. But when the brake rotors are running at about 1000F, the street pads would be useless while the track pads would grip like a mofo. That only happens on the track though -- lap after lap of continuous heavy braking.

 

Either you have something wrong with your brakes, or you are badly misjudging the MY04 brakes. The OEM brakes on the 04 are spectacular, by any objective measure. I even had my car on the track twice with the stock brakes, with absolutely no fade (although I melted a bit of the pad onto a rotor), despite once going about 25 straight laps, very hard, with repeated very hard braking (125-60; 100-30; 100-50; 90-40). I have changed to Cobalt GTS, which I will inaugurate on the track on Thursday, but there is nothing wrong with a healthy set of OEM brakes on this car.

 

I installed a set of '04 pads on my '02 and noticed less initial bite during braking. For a relatively cheap solution to your complaint you might want to try a set of pre '04 pads on your car.

 

I guess it's the initial bite I'm referring to. I feel like if I need to do some quick emergency braking, I would probably have to stand on them to get a strong bite on the brakes.

 

Give 'em some time to get used to, they don't have the initial bite of say, an M3, but they are very linear and stop the car in a hurry if you get on them hard. For the street my stock pads are perfect, great feel and almost no dust.

For the track I have a set of Porterfield R4 pads and I've changed to Motul brake fluid. After driving it on the track I can't really imagine needing much more braking than that on street tires. They have significantly more bite and hold up to the track great. I swap back to the stock pads for street driving, only takes about 30 minutes.

 

for better feel i think. feels weaker than bmw which feels weaker than a mercedes but i doubt it stops shorter.
try doing some squats or heavier sneakers