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Originally Posted by AU N EGL
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GordonG How is brake overheating down to poor braking technique? in simple terms, the temperature of the brakes is a result of the energy to be dissipated over the time of the brake application. The harder you brake (in simple terms) the hotter they get, right?
You are correct
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I know I'm going to get into a shedfull of trouble for this, but from personal experience, both of these are wrong.
I spent nearly a year trying to stop the brakes on a big Jaguar from overheating when I was racing. I tried all sorts of high temperature pads and fluids and various ducting and nothing helped... until one day I read that braking too gently could be the cause. So I went out and instead of gently progressing the brakes on, modulating them over bumps and and surface changes, then rolling gently off them, I tried nailing them as hard and short as I could without locking the tyres. I then had all sorts of suspension instability to deal with, but one thing was for sure, the short hard braking completely sorted my pad/fluid/disc overheating problems. I then even managed to change to a softer pad and get better feel and still didn't overheat them.
I belive the explanation for all of this is quite simple. Time may not be a factor in the equations which relate the total energy disappated to the total retardation, but it is certainly a big factor when it comes to transmitting heat through materials, and for disappating heat from surfaces. Put simply, consider these two things... First, the more of a lap you spend on the brakes, the less of it is spent cooling the discs down, and the latter is one of the main controlling factors in how hot the brakes run. Secondly, I'm pretty sure (please don't make me go get my old thermodynamic books out on this) that exposing the surface of an object to a very high temperature for a very short time transmits less heat into its interior that a lower temperature for a longer time. So short hard braking doesn't heat the interior of the calipers and discs up as much as longer braking.
Ducks and waits for verbal lashing
