Preparing For A Track Day Part 2: Brakes

Introduction - Part 2

In my last post I wrote a brief introduction and discussed how I set up data logging to prepare a Subaru BRZ for its (and my) first HPDE / track days. Now I'll continue with brake upgrades.

I starting thinking about brake upgrades while reading the FT86Club.com Forums and coming across a bunch of posts from people who reported varying degrees of brake fade when tracking their cars. I know there are a lot of factors that figure into whether or not brake fade will happen on track; driver skill, the nature of the track, session length, and any modifications to the car all play a part. Unfortunately, at this point all I have to go on are the stories of other people's experiences. I understand that it's hard to predict exactly how my brakes will perform based on what I find in forum posts but I think Ben Franklin's proverb "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" applies here so I decided on doing at least a very mild brake upgrade.

Also, in addition to trying to hold off brake fade I also wanted to improve the feel of the BRZ's brakes. I know this is very subjective but I found the BRZ's brakes to be a little bit more squishy than I expected them to be. After some research I found that they could be stiffened significantly with a couple of relatively simple modifications.

Improving Brake Feel

To improve brake feel I decided to do two things - replace my brake lines with a set of braided stainless steel lines from StopTech and install a Perrin Performance master cylinder brace.

The brake lines were ordered through and installed by Cantech Automotive. This is a little off topic but if you're in the central New York area and need work done on a sports car you should consider Cantech. They're one of the only shops in he area that specializes in sports cars and exotics.

One of the front brake lines after installation

One of the rear brake lines after installation

Before owning my BRZ I had never heard of a master cylinder brace. To sum it up, on some cars (like the BRZ / FR-S) the firewall and brake master cylinder mount actually deflect slightly during hard braking. That deflection results in slightly longer pedal travel than would otherwise be necessary. To see exactly what I'm talking about check out this video from GrimmSpeed.

I decided to purchase the Perrin Performance brace after watching this video from FT86SpeedFactory.com. Installation was very easy; Perrin's instructions were good, all necessary hardware was included, and the required holes were already drilled and threaded so no modification to the car was required. Actually, it's like Subaru pre-planned for people to install something like this.

Up-close view of the master cylinder brace after installation. Also notice the blue brake fluid

I actually took quite a lot of pictures of the installation and I intend to write up a how-to later.

Improving Fade Resistance

To improve the brakes fade resistance I decided to upgrade the brake hydraulic fluid and change the brake pads.

Changing the BRZ's brake fluid was a no-brainer for two reasons. First, fresh fluid was required by my track day organization. Second, the brakes at least needed to be bled once the new brake lines were installed. It seemed logical, then, to have Cantech hook my car up to their power bleeder and the tool used to cycle the ABS pump and completely replace all brake fluid with ATE Super Blue Racing.

Regarding brake pads, I decided to change the OEM brake pads with StopTech Street Performance pads. They were a direct replacement to the stock brake pads and I encountered no issues during installation.

Front brake pads - StopTech 309.15390

Rear brake pads - StopTech 309.11240

Conclusion

To recap, my goal with this brake upgrade was to improve brake feel and fade resistance.

Brake feel was noticeably improved after the installation of braided stainless steel brake lines and the master cylinder brace. During anything but the lightest braking I can definitely tell that the brakes on my BRZ are much stiffer than they were before.

Regarding fade resistance, at this point I'm really not sure. I have never encountered it on the street with this car and I haven't tracked my car pre-upgrade so I don't (and won't) have a benchmark to use for comparison. All I can say is that I'll report back after my HPDE is over!

10/06/2013 - Update - Preparing For A Track Day Part 3: How Things Went has been published