Groove
 

Transferred this out of a different thread and put it somewhere more applicable where I also wouldn't be thread jacking:

At my last track day with the XP10s on the front I was getting pretty thick visible deposit buildup on the rotor surface.. After a while I could definitely feel the rough surface of the rotor in the brake pedal in a few brake zones. Didn't warp or significantly crack the rotors though. I did drive around the paddock for a few minutes after the cooldown lap and pushed my car back and forth a bit after I parked it. Thinking of hacksawing a shallow tangential groove (and filing the edges) into the middle of the XP10 pads since they don't have one (even though I do use slotted rotors) and they do have those 2 small holes which are maybe intended to perform the same function?

Which is why I haven't done it and mentioned it here ;). It used to be common practice with some race teams (cutting them), (don't know if its still done, I had assumed all race application pads now had them from the factory) in fact Carrol Smith talks about it in his book Tune to Win. The goal is to give the (new and old) brake dust somewhere to go rather than being pushed back into the rotor material by the rest of the pad. This way more of the pad is seeing a clean/clear surface when it makes contact with the rotor. It also helps somewhat with cooling the pad. It doesn't have anything to do with gassing, which is a thing of the past.

Also I don't believe there is anything special about the material at the front or back edge of the pads to begin with so how would adding another front and rear edge do anything bad?

not sure the point of this thread, but some groove is normal. my G has grooves on its factory brembo rotors that i could feel with my finger tips, braking is still plenty strong.

i see that the original post was edited... but im still :confused:

I think you misunderstood, so I rewrote my post just slightly to make it more clear. In short I am proposing hacksawing a groove into my front XP10 brake pads perpendicular to their long axis (don't know how to express that clearly with smaller words) with the goal of getting a smoother and more consistent transfer layer of pad material on the rotor surface. Curious if anyone has done this modification to pads before and seen any difference. Even the less track oriented pads I use for the street (Endless MX72s) have this groove from the factory.

oh, you mean like this kinda?

http://www.roadrunner.travel/wp/wp-c...Brake-Pads.jpg

Yep, exactly :tup:

:tup: but not sure if okay to alter just any pads like that? :ugh:

Radial is the shortest word I can come up with. YMMV

TFIWYAM!

the f- is with your acronyms mang! :mad:

:rofl2:

Yeah, before I go hacksawing my pads and end up in a wall just wanted to run it by the forum and see if there was any 1st hand experience with this.

Yes I did a quick google of that, still not quite sure how it was applicable but I just went with it and tried not to be offended that he thought a link to the definition of radial was necessary :tup:

yah, im thinking it might disintegrate if the hardness is not right. those pads (as you know) can get EXTREMELY hot. :D

Yes, they certainly do. But there are already 2 edges on them, why would 4 be bad? If you look at factory pads with these cuts it actually looks like they were cut after the fact as well.


Nice rims btw, what are those?

That would be my worry. In theory, it should work (lots of pads have one or more grooves) but the pad may not handle the stress of cutting the groove and/or any extra stress created in use.

Personally, I'd get pads that are designed/manufactured with the groove rather than risk failure from a mod gone wrong. Brakes are pretty high on my No Experimenting List. Better safe than sorry.

Yes, I have considered that and I appreciate the opinion. Just trying to see if anyone has actually done this or not so I can get some info based on experience.