[GregWeld]

I happened to be back in Seattle area for the weekend - and ended up helping a buddy sort thru some issues with his brakes. Interesting because he owns two HEAVY cars with big ass powerful motors. One is a '56 BelAir with a BBC 8 stack - and Wilwood 6 piston front (12.88 rotor) with 4 piston rears. The other is a '57 2 door post with Wilwood 6 piston front - same size rotor - and what I think might be 6 piston rears. Both run 6 to 1 pedal ratio. Both use Wilwood 7/8ths master cylinders.

The '56 has always had TERRIBLE brakes. The effort was never rewarded with the commensurate confidence in the brakes. I've worked on this car numerous hours.... and we've done the pedal ratio properly. I put a new Wilwood dual chamber 7/8ths Master Cylinder on with 3/16th's SS lines. We've done the "bedding" routine. The car had been on the road awhile before many changes where made etc - but the brake "kit" was put on when the car was built and other than changing from power brakes to manual "the kit" was as it was installed and with previous miles on it. The car sucked.

The '57 was a purchase from Ironworks with an Ironworks chassis. A brand new never hit the street brake system. All proper. 525hp LS3. Barely apply the brakes and it will throw you thru the windshield.... Brakes as they should be!

So the effort this weekend was to figure out the difference. Off come the wheels so we could pull pads and make that comparo first. Sure enough - the '57 is running BP10's -- the lousy '56 is running a PolyMatrix pad. The CALIPERS are the same - Superlite Narrow (thin) - and on a big heavy car like these two are - they should be running the Aero. The Superlite Narrows (and standard Superlite) run a bolt with a spacer for the pad retention - where the Aero run a BRIDGE. The Aero would be a stiffer caliper. That's not the issue though -- that's just info!

So a quick call to Ron Sutton Race Technologies -- and confirmation that the pad compound in the '56 is "part" of the problem.... seems that pad will work great with some heat built up - but these are street cars with a 78 year old driver. NO HEAT will ever been built up. LOL. So new pad compound is calculated and ordered. Now there's another issue noticed. The pad is shinny and the rotors are like mirrors. In an effort to get the car to stop --- with all manor of different leg strategies etc - the pads and rotors are GLAZED... They're glazed because the brakes never worked from the get go and never had any bite and blah blah blah. The wrong pad -- and now that's gotten even worse and created another issue. The rotors will have to have some face work done or even the new pads won't work.

I write this because I wonder how many other folks are out there with similar issues - after having spent a small fortune on big ass brakes - that SUCK - but perhaps they're afraid to come forward and say so?!?!?!?!

The new pads for the '56 will be Wilwood Polymatrix 15E - XXXX. They should have BITE regardless of temperatures.