From BIRA member Paul Waterloo, Sept 2003:
Went to the Audi Club event on Monday and Tuesday with my A8 and System
6. Have Pagid Orange pads on front and back for the track.
All I can say is WOW! My car was just awesome! The brakes were nothing short of
incredible.
The Pagid orange pads are great. Didn't overheat once.
I was in the "B" run group, which is still newbie. The A8 could keep up with all
S4's on the straights, the only car that it couldn't was a new BMW M3 and a C4
Corvette with 400 HP. Just needed a corner to catch up with them.
However, at the end of each straight and going into almost all other braking
zones, I could easily out brake any other car in my run group. Turn 1
especially.
On my 5th run of the two days, I really laid into the brakes hard on turn 1 and
turn 3 and going into Canada Corner. The brakes just worked like a champ, making
just the coolest noise slowing the car down.
I did that for about 2 laps and figured out that it is hard to modulate the
brakes back off (with my lack of skills) smoothly. I think I could also gage my
speed better by braking a little earlier and a little less, and then carry more
momentum into the corner. This is my street car too, so I figure I don't need to
break anything, plus I could go faster with less braking.
After the run session of really pressing hard, I could feel them getting soft.
Extra pedal travel was evident. I couldn't figure out why that is, there is no
air in the system. A lot of people have this problem at the track.
I figured it everything getting so hot, and possibly the stock rear brake lines
(not being stainless braided) was flexing/expanding due to extreme temps.
Without doing anything, my next run session (2 hours later), the pedal feel was
returned. After driving the car home and letting it sit over night, the pedal is
very, very firm again with the Pagid pads.
I will be switching back to the stock Porsche/Audi pads for the street this
weekend, I find that the pedal is definitely more spongy with stock
compound, I attribute that to the hardness of the pads (i.e. being softer than
the Pagid pads).
Great work BIRA!
Click
here for more info from Paul's web site!