Soloontario

Normally we would expect sig higher temps up front and that is why front brakes are larger and have more pad swept area as well as cooling. OTOH, the rear calipers are small, the pad area is smaller and the rotor is smaller. My question is what sort of temps are you seeing at your rotors both front and rear? No I don't have temperature sensitive paint..

At issue is the decision to use a different pad for it's different temperature range at the rear if indeed the actual rear temps are lower but are they?

Socko

If you leave the nannies on in a c5z you can get some really high rear brake temps, high enough to start having some weird issues. Even in comp mode, unless you are exceeding the slip angles that activate it regularly, they are noticeably cooler and stay well under the front rotor temps as long as you keep the tire circomference ratio intact front to rear. I never had paint either but I had weird issue with the rear brakes if I forgot to switch to comp mode.

Walt G

I have taken my C5Z to the track three times now, about an hour of track time each event. I put Hawk DTC 60's on the front and left OEM-style pads in the rear. After three hours on the track, the rear pads are gone. I suspect I did over heat them and then they pretty much disintegrated, but I don't know how hot they actually got. I had a ton of brake dust from the rear after the third track event.

I do know that they were cooler than the front though, because my Dad was at the track with me and said he could see my front brake rotors glowing red in the braking zone at the end of the straightaway... he didn't mention seeing the rears glowing.

I was hoping to avoid swapping both front and rear pads and rotors for track days, but I'm leaning that way now. I'm interested to hear from the more experienced guys though.

Socko

I ran xp10/xp10 and xp10/xp8 setups on my c5z with rivals, so street tires. As long as traction control was in at least comp mode, rear brakes were never a concern, cracked some front rotors but rears lasted fine. Both brake setups worked fine, but i had the car height fairly high(relative to what most people run) at the gm specified height and a bit of rear toe in(3/32" per side) to keep the car inline braking. I never tried running without rear track pads as i had been on track befor ei had the c5z. Its probably fine if you are very new to track events but its not a good idea once you have an event or 2 under your belt. C5Z is no joke on the track, don't treat it like one by running it on track with street pads.

If you have more tire you will likely need more pad, but the c5z is pretty light so it did just fine with 10's on street tires.

Soloontario

I don't use the nannies at all but if I do end up into the antilocks, I am not always sure which end is locking up. It often feels like the rear but I am really not so sure.

I am running Raybestos ST43s front and rear but am concerned that the rear pad might be a bit much. OTOH it is a much smaller pad applying torque to a smaller rotor. I much prefer these pads to Carbotech 10s and 12s

tmtraylor

I use the Temperature paint on the rotors and paint a section of the cooling vanes. Front and Rear both turn to the same color (Yellow which is ~1076F). I have run ST43 all around, ST45 or ST47 on the Front with ST43 on the rear... no difference in temps.

Tim

Adam@Amp'dAutosport.com

What tires are you using?

The great thing about Carbotech is all their compounds are compatible with each other so. when going from the 1521 to the XP series pads all you have to do is swap pads and go no re-bedding no cleaning of the rotors just swap pads and go.

Walt G

I run R888R's in 315-30-18 square for my track setup.

I admit that being able to swap between street and track pads without also changing the rotors is a selling feature I put some value in. Carbotech is the only brand I've heard specifically that this can be done with.

This is what my rear pads looked like after about 3 hours on-track.

Soloontario

That was my guess i.e that the temps were actually pretty close even though the actual amount of heat dissipated at the front is much higher.. This is a good argument to use the same pads front and rear. I too, am running ST43s front and rear and have been very pleased with the wear.