Friend just got his Rx-8 brakes upgraded.

Very impressive I must say.

Cross drilled & slotted front+rear discs (original RX-8 types) AP racing 6-spot calipers.

Stopping power is improved considerably.

He got the work done through ROTORMASTER in Sydney






Apologies for the poor quality pic as its from my mobile phone camera

 

They must be awsome. What are the pads? I thought I would never have to upgrade mine. What exactly do you mean by "original RX-8 types"?

Are the rear calipers AP 6 spotters as well?

Cheers,
Hymee.

 

Hmmm, after reading this post on Ausrotary... well, you do the maths... http://ausrotary.dntinternet.com/for...a6ed8ad058ed62

 

Woah! That's an interesting perspective on rotor workshops. I'm glad my Renesis won't need rebuliding while it's in my hands. Thanks for the link pepe.

P.S. Why do I have a sudden urge to swear lots after reading that thread?? :p

 

I assume he means they were the as supplied normaly from mazda then drilled and slotted. Poor form, not a good move.

The RX-8 already stops qicker than most things on the roads (better than the M3 BMW etc) and unless your realy pushing it on track doesnt suffer from brake fade either.

I dont see why you'd want to upgrade the brakes at all?

 

There is nothing wrong with cross drilling and slotting original brake rotors. After all, cross drilled rotors are only off the shelf rotors with holes drilled in them. My only problem with cross drilled rotors is that they crack very easily becasue of thermal cycling.

On my dearly departed MX 5 race car we grafted RX7 brakes onto it and slotted the rotors to aid with disc cleaning. Wouldn't cross drill them though as you lose significant life.

 

Not true.

You can have drilled rotors, or rotors that have holes cast in them at the time there made. 2 different things.

Although both arnt good for the rotors anyhow.

And as for cleaning , wern't sloted rotors for when the pads used to give off gasses, which they no longer do?

Even companies like porche tend to fit normal or sloted/drilled on a whim. same car, different countries, different rotors.

I havnt yet heard a decent argument for sloted/drilled that holds up.

And if you need better brakes on your RX-8 than standard on roads (not track) then you need to slow down.

 

I would like to be able to quantify all this on the track. I probably would look at putting some good super hi-temp fuild in first, like Castrol R ($120/l, the very best), or Mutol ($25/500ml, my choice for a great performing product at the right price). That is the first thing to try to prevent - boiled fluid.

Compared to the SS I used to take on the track... The RX-8's back discs are bigger then the SS's fronts.

And I also saw a review/opinion somewhere that favoured the RX-8's 'noname' brake package over the 35oz's Brembo kit.

Cheers,
Hymee.

 

Rob,didn't know that cross drilled rotors could be bought cast. True, modern pads don't gas as did old ones, however the chap who built my car (also used to vuild formula holdens, and is also building a supercar at the moment...pretty experienced) insisted the slots were put on the rotors to continually clean the face. Just parroting what I've been told.

 

I guess there are others that aslo believe that slotting also cleans the pads

http://www.performancepartz.com/index.php?cPath=160

To seriously increase brkaing performance braided lines are damn important, however the authorites have deemed these to not be street legal....figure that!

 

AMG

The Bates boys here in Canberra (Neil and Rick, rally types) run an automotive workshop like you wouldn't believe... they have legal braided lines... last time I was out there, they insisted they were the only street legal ones available in Oz... can probably dig up a number if anyone's keen for details

 

The brake upgrade was done for looks as much as performance. The discs are the orignial RX-8 ones, just cross drilled & slotted. Only the fronts where upgraded to 6-spot calipers as the rears required even more modification to fit & the price went skyward.

As for the loser bagging out Rotormaster, I wouldn't worry. Whether its Ric Shaw, Rotormaster, Pacman, Maztech, Mazfix, REVS etc etc. (All the rotary shops) you are always going to get some bodgy kid who stacks the deck against the shop.

More often than not they rock in with there $300 wrecking yard engine to have the bodgy installed Micro-tech injection ECU tuned. After tuning they are putting out 50% more power & punch through the engines aging & scorn limits to pop.

They then complain that the engine was fine before the (insert name) shop tuned it or attached the 300,000km old turbo charger & that its all the fault of the rotary shop that touched it last.

You will never stop those types no matter what you do.

 

gah, I hope they were properly balanced then, else they could seriously ruin stopping power.

 

DBA said it was more of an issue of preventing gas pressure build up between the pad and disc when I asked them. For whatever reason though, they work much better for circuit racing and I'll never go back to stock discs on my car again. You do get a very small amount of pedal feedback on light applications at high speed when they're pretty cold, but I only notice that about once every 6 months.

-pete