Toddy 7 Posted April 21, 2006 Thought I would share with you this advice! Nick Adams (Lotus develloping engineer) Hi Ross, Alastair and Dave recommend the following procedure for bedding Elise brakes in: With new pads and discs, or just new pads fitted run the car around for 10/20 miles using the brakes gently as normal to bed the two surfaces together. Once this has been done, check the surfaces of the discs and make sure here are no signs of any scoring or damage. Assuming all looks well take the car to an appropriate piece of quiet and straight, well sighted road and perform half a dozen medium pressure stops from 50 mph down to 20 mph to warm the brakes up. Avoid more than a minute between each stop so that the temperatures do not get a chance to deteriorate too much. Once the brakes are warm and the coast is clear, perform 2 or 3 hard stops from 70mph (where local laws allow!) to 20 mph, braking as hard as you can without locking up. Do not come to a halt between each stop, do them as fast as you can to get the brakes really hot. On the third stop come to a halt and keeping your foot on the brake press the brake pedal down as hard as you can and hold it there for at least a couple of minutes, don't apply the handbrake. This hurts if you are doing it right! This will bed the pistons, shims and pads together and will compress the pad material, giving a hard and repeatable pedal. Once the 2 minutes have passed, release the pedal and go for a short drive, using the brakes as normal to let everything return to normal temperatures. The brakes are now fully bedded in and ready for use in anger. Recompressing the pads once every few thousand miles to the above procedure will help keep the pedal firm, especially if you don't normally use the brakes hard. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jonD6B 0 Posted April 21, 2006 Very interesting. I assume this applies to all discs and pads? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
veloce200 3 Posted April 21, 2006 thats more like the bed in procedure you'd do on a race car, in reality that could end up toasting a lot of sliding caliper set ups which need a lot more time to develop a good contact patch across the whole pad. theory is right though - gradual baking of the resins throughout the pad. I'd say do that procedure without the holding the pedal down bit and with at least 100-200 miles very gentle braking to develop the contact patch first. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jonD6B 0 Posted April 21, 2006 thats more like the bed in procedure you'd do on a race car, in reality that could end up toasting a lot of sliding caliper set ups which need a lot more time to develop a good contact patch across the whole pad. theory is right though - gradual baking of the resins throughout the pad. I'd say do that procedure without the holding the pedal down bit and with at least 100-200 miles very gentle braking to develop the contact patch first. That sounds more realistic on an ordinary compound pad. Any idea what pads Lotus send the Elise out of the factory with then? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted April 22, 2006 the mintex recommended bed in procedure differs slightly.. 3 x 30-0mph 3 x 50-0mph 3 x 70-0mph in one session. then gentle for a bit and let the patch develope, as the feel comes off you go. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jonD6B 0 Posted April 22, 2006 What are the consequences of pads being bedded in to lightly, in any? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Toddy 7 Posted April 22, 2006 Elises come from the factory with standard pagid's i believe Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
veloce200 3 Posted April 22, 2006 What are the consequences of pads being bedded in to lightly, in any? I think the danger is if you're too light on them when you first use them in anger the resin that holds the whole thing together will overheat at the surface level. I'm told by my suppliers they'll still work but never last as long or be as reliable as a well bedded in pad. General view seems to be once you've pushed them harder and harder in the bed in phase if you then get fade you need to leave them to cool completely and then they're ready. Danger seems to be that too much too soon and you don't have a layer of friction material on the disc (which is why discs and pads should be bedded separately not togther). Discs and Pads changed together need a different type of bed in again. Discs need to be heat cycled first with a gentle braking effort - 50-30 mph then 0.5 mls no braking, and so on - about 15 times. Bit like making a chisel I guess! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
