Model S Plaid Brakes Are Terrible!

[lbowroom]

Mountain Pass has rotors sourced from GiroDisc in OE and 400mm sizes.

 

[Aggmeister2010]

aren’t the tesla CCBs only compatible with arachnid 21s? If so that’s not good for people that want the ccbs but still need to put smaller wheels on for track or winter.

Anyone yet have the new Brembo steel kit? T sportline has it listed on their site.

I have an AP Racing setup on my 1st Gen that's 410mm, same diameter as Tesla's stock setup for the Plaid. It looks like from that youtuber video that the CCBs are the same diameter as the base setup, but the caliper is "beefy," and thus won't fit in a 20 inch wheel.

 

[Awiner]

I have an AP Racing setup on my 1st Gen that's 410mm, same diameter as Tesla's stock setup for the Plaid. It looks like from that youtuber video that the CCBs are the same diameter as the base setup, but the caliper is "beefy," and thus won't fit in a 20 inch wheel.

The Tesla CCB specs are:

• 2x 410 x 40mm carbon-silicon carbide front rotors
• 2x 410 x 32mm carbon-silicon carbide rear rotors
• 2x 6-piston one-piece, forged front calipers
• 2x 4-piston one-piece, forged rear calipers

Whereas the 2021-2022 stock “base” plaid brakes are:

Front: Four piston, fixed	Calipers
Rear: Single piston, floating
Front: 395 mm	Rotor Diameters (ventilated)
Rear: 365 mm

 

[lolachampcar]

I was thinking Orbis brakes but I just tried their web site and it may be highjacking now.

Found a link that works but nothing about the S on their main page.

ORBIS Brakes | The Future Of Braking

orbisbrakes.com

 

[NeuroRad]

I have an AP Racing setup on my 1st Gen that's 410mm, same diameter as Tesla's stock setup for the Plaid. It looks like from that youtuber video that the CCBs are the same diameter as the base setup, but the caliper is "beefy," and thus won't fit in a 20 inch wheel.

That setup looks fantastic. Will it work on the palladium model S?

 

[bizi]

Did you go from a Taycan to a Model 3 Performance? If so why?

 

[Sam1]

Mountain Pass has rotors sourced from GiroDisc in OE and 400mm sizes.

Girodiscs and PFC pads are an awesome combo. Car actually stops like it should.

 

[bhzmark]

Another data point on stock Plaid brakes found on Twitter. Stock plaid is tied with the carbon ceramic lighter BMW M5 CS from 70 mph and Plaid is 10 feet shorter from 100 mph. BMW has wider tires up front too.

 

[Gninoked]

Another data point on stock Plaid brakes found on Twitter. Stock plaid is tied with the carbon ceramic lighter BMW M5 CS from 70 mph and Plaid is 10 feet shorter from 100 mph. BMW has wider tires up front too.

View attachment 910077

As long as the brakes can lock up the wheels (which basically every brake system these days can) these are tire/ABS tests, not brake tests.

 

[Richbot]

As long as the brakes can lock up the wheels (which basically every brake system these days can) these are tire/ABS tests, not brake tests.

Yep. Now do it 3 times, or 5 times. Fade resistance is consistently noted as "poor" or "iffy" by reviewers, including c/d.

Also, point of order, tire *height* (longitudinal patch) makes more of a difference than width. S has significantly bigger tires, overall, than the M5, because they're basically .5-1" larger diameter. But the S doesn't come on Cup tires, so, it's a wash IMO. They obviously work quite well in one stop, but that's not what this thread is about.

c/d on the brakes:

But, trust us, you don't want to do 200 mph in this car. Even 162 mph was terrifying, wandering and nervous to the point that we were concerned about our ability to shepherd it between lane lines. The steering doesn't firm up enough with speed, making the task more difficult. At similar velocities, a Taycan is resolutely stable. Another reason to fear a 200-mph speed is brakes that got soft during our testing. Although our braking regimen isn't nearly as severe as what a racetrack demands, a warning message reporting the brakes' demise popped up on the dash. Between the flappability at high speeds and the iffy brakes, our helmets are way off to former FIA GT racing driver Andreas Simonsen, who piloted the Plaid to what must have been a harrowing 7:35 Nürburgring lap.

There are other examples obviously, but a car is judged as a whole and brakes that would barely hold up on a Long Range definitely aren't adequate on the Plaid for *performance driving*, which is one of the main selling points of getting the Plaid in the first place! Nevermind that there are still times that you might fade the brakes just minding your own business, like the harrowing Holiday Weekend Descent from the Resorts on I70. Hopefully you're just in regen the whole time, but there's no stopping the jerrys from jerrying on the way down...

It's not like this isn't a solved problem. 600hp brakes (that also fade on the base car, because other 600hp heavy sedans come with more expensive brakes with much, much better fade resistance) on a 1000hp car, with the same pads, calipers, non-floating rotors, no ducting etc. as the 670hp base model, and not a ton of improvements compared to what came on the 450hp Model S 75, other than more regen. I bet ducting, alone, with no other changes, would make a huge difference to everyone's user experience, but that's extra drag and we can't have that on our 1000hp car. I get it, they're fine for 95% of the time, they have to work cold, yada, I've said all that on here myself. but when the entire point of buying the Plaid is being an edgelord who wants to deploy 1000hp on the street, well, that last 5% starts to matter...It's expensive to put brakes that can stand up to this kind of punishment, both in dollars and efficiency, and Tesla figured the edgelords would be the only one who noticed and they'd spring for the CCB's. Maybe they're right, eventually. But I don't think so in light of the initial reviews from regular dudes who have faded these brakes on a twisty backroad...

Love the plaid S potential owner here, but I'm very glad there's a thriving Tesla aftermarket tackling this problem. I'm no stranger to fast cars with brakes that can't hack it on a track. The reviews of the Refresh S brakes are different from that, they seem to have put much more capable 10 or 9 second powertrains, and WAY BETTER suspensions and wheel/tire fitments, on the same 10 or 12 second brake capability they had in the pre-refresh cars, and added more regen. 9/10ths of the way there, but not there yet. Reminds me of when Nissan released a 350Z with a big Brembo package that still faded so hard without warning the driver was yeeted off the track with almost no warning...TRACK PACK as in pack your bags you're going to the ER

 

[Gninoked]

Yep. Now do it 3 times, or 5 times. Fade resistance is consistently noted as "poor" or "iffy" by reviewers, including c/d.

Also, point of order, tire *height* (longitudinal patch) makes more of a difference than width. S has significantly bigger tires, overall, than the M5, because they're basically .5-1" larger diameter. But the S doesn't come on Cup tires, so, it's a wash IMO. They obviously work quite well in one stop, but that's not what this thread is about.

c/d on the brakes:

But, trust us, you don't want to do 200 mph in this car. Even 162 mph was terrifying, wandering and nervous to the point that we were concerned about our ability to shepherd it between lane lines. The steering doesn't firm up enough with speed, making the task more difficult. At similar velocities, a Taycan is resolutely stable. Another reason to fear a 200-mph speed is brakes that got soft during our testing. Although our braking regimen isn't nearly as severe as what a racetrack demands, a warning message reporting the brakes' demise popped up on the dash. Between the flappability at high speeds and the iffy brakes, our helmets are way off to former FIA GT racing driver Andreas Simonsen, who piloted the Plaid to what must have been a harrowing 7:35 Nürburgring lap.

There are other examples obviously, but a car is judged as a whole and brakes that would barely hold up on a Long Range definitely aren't adequate on the Plaid for *performance driving*, which is one of the main selling points of getting the Plaid in the first place! Nevermind that there are still times that you might fade the brakes just minding your own business, like the harrowing Holiday Weekend Descent from the Resorts on I70. Hopefully you're just in regen the whole time, but there's no stopping the jerrys from jerrying on the way down...

It's not like this isn't a solved problem. 600hp brakes (that also fade on the base car, because other 600hp heavy sedans come with more expensive brakes with much, much better fade resistance) on a 1000hp car, with the same pads, calipers, non-floating rotors, no ducting etc. as the 670hp base model, and not a ton of improvements compared to what came on the 450hp Model S 75, other than more regen. I bet ducting, alone, with no other changes, would make a huge difference to everyone's user experience, but that's extra drag and we can't have that on our 1000hp car. I get it, they're fine for 95% of the time, they have to work cold, yada, I've said all that on here myself. but when the entire point of buying the Plaid is being an edgelord who wants to deploy 1000hp on the street, well, that last 5% starts to matter...It's expensive to put brakes that can stand up to this kind of punishment, both in dollars and efficiency, and Tesla figured the edgelords would be the only one who noticed and they'd spring for the CCB's. Maybe they're right, eventually. But I don't think so in light of the initial reviews from regular dudes who have faded these brakes on a twisty backroad...

Love the plaid S potential owner here, but I'm very glad there's a thriving Tesla aftermarket tackling this problem. I'm no stranger to fast cars with brakes that can't hack it on a track. The reviews of the Refresh S brakes are different from that, they seem to have put much more capable 10 or 9 second powertrains, and WAY BETTER suspensions and wheel/tire fitments, on the same 10 or 12 second brake capability they had in the pre-refresh cars, and added more regen. 9/10ths of the way there, but not there yet. Reminds me of when Nissan released a 350Z with a big Brembo package that still faded so hard without warning the driver was yeeted off the track with almost no warning...TRACK PACK as in pack your bags you're going to the ER

This version of the plaid wasn't designed for track use, that's fairly obvious. They had the '+' for that but decided not to release it for whatever reason. This is the 'muscle' version of the car - and yes it came with the same brakes as the LR which are designed for comfort and long service intervals which is probably the right decision for most (>50%) plaid owners.

I'm curious to see what people think of the new plaid pads. Obviously we've gone way over and above that to get the brakes up to par for track use, but I still believe that a performance pad is all 90%+ of Plaid owners will ever need and if the plaid comes with a bit more maintenance and expense that's just fine. If Tesla has spec'd a pad that covers 'performance' street driving and then offers the CCBs from the "+" as their 'track' option (ignoring that we can get there aftermarket with iron far cheaper!) they've probably done the right thing at the cost of complexity to their product line. Which - 2 years into the run - they can probably handle.

 

[juanmedina]

Another data point on stock Plaid brakes found on Twitter. Stock plaid is tied with the carbon ceramic lighter BMW M5 CS from 70 mph and Plaid is 10 feet shorter from 100 mph. BMW has wider tires up front too.

View attachment 910077

and the Model S Plaid beats the Taycan Turbo S by 5ft from 70mph

People just don't know what they are talking about. I took my Plaid to autocross 100% stock and I never got a temp warning. I took my car to a track day at Atlanta Motorsport Park and Road Atlanta with Carbotech pads and Motul Fluid and it was fine. If you are not a pro driver that know how to drive the hell out of the car you will be fine. People just like to make noise for no reason.

 

[juanmedina]

Yep. Now do it 3 times, or 5 times. Fade resistance is consistently noted as "poor" or "iffy" by reviewers, including c/d.

Also, point of order, tire *height* (longitudinal patch) makes more of a difference than width. S has significantly bigger tires, overall, than the M5, because they're basically .5-1" larger diameter. But the S doesn't come on Cup tires, so, it's a wash IMO. They obviously work quite well in one stop, but that's not what this thread is about.

c/d on the brakes:

But, trust us, you don't want to do 200 mph in this car. Even 162 mph was terrifying, wandering and nervous to the point that we were concerned about our ability to shepherd it between lane lines. The steering doesn't firm up enough with speed, making the task more difficult. At similar velocities, a Taycan is resolutely stable. Another reason to fear a 200-mph speed is brakes that got soft during our testing. Although our braking regimen isn't nearly as severe as what a racetrack demands, a warning message reporting the brakes' demise popped up on the dash. Between the flappability at high speeds and the iffy brakes, our helmets are way off to former FIA GT racing driver Andreas Simonsen, who piloted the Plaid to what must have been a harrowing 7:35 Nürburgring lap.

There are other examples obviously, but a car is judged as a whole and brakes that would barely hold up on a Long Range definitely aren't adequate on the Plaid for *performance driving*, which is one of the main selling points of getting the Plaid in the first place! Nevermind that there are still times that you might fade the brakes just minding your own business, like the harrowing Holiday Weekend Descent from the Resorts on I70. Hopefully you're just in regen the whole time, but there's no stopping the jerrys from jerrying on the way down...

It's not like this isn't a solved problem. 600hp brakes (that also fade on the base car, because other 600hp heavy sedans come with more expensive brakes with much, much better fade resistance) on a 1000hp car, with the same pads, calipers, non-floating rotors, no ducting etc. as the 670hp base model, and not a ton of improvements compared to what came on the 450hp Model S 75, other than more regen. I bet ducting, alone, with no other changes, would make a huge difference to everyone's user experience, but that's extra drag and we can't have that on our 1000hp car. I get it, they're fine for 95% of the time, they have to work cold, yada, I've said all that on here myself. but when the entire point of buying the Plaid is being an edgelord who wants to deploy 1000hp on the street, well, that last 5% starts to matter...It's expensive to put brakes that can stand up to this kind of punishment, both in dollars and efficiency, and Tesla figured the edgelords would be the only one who noticed and they'd spring for the CCB's. Maybe they're right, eventually. But I don't think so in light of the initial reviews from regular dudes who have faded these brakes on a twisty backroad...

Love the plaid S potential owner here, but I'm very glad there's a thriving Tesla aftermarket tackling this problem. I'm no stranger to fast cars with brakes that can't hack it on a track. The reviews of the Refresh S brakes are different from that, they seem to have put much more capable 10 or 9 second powertrains, and WAY BETTER suspensions and wheel/tire fitments, on the same 10 or 12 second brake capability they had in the pre-refresh cars, and added more regen. 9/10ths of the way there, but not there yet. Reminds me of when Nissan released a 350Z with a big Brembo package that still faded so hard without warning the driver was yeeted off the track with almost no warning...TRACK PACK as in pack your bags you're going to the ER

Car and Driver Test methodology is 6 braking events

Braking​

Chassis performance testing answers two essential questions: how short can a car stop, and how hard can it turn. Our standard braking testing consists of six stops from 70 mph to zero. Five of them are done in close succession, with the sixth stop coming after approximately a mile of cooling so that we can roughly determine how well the brakes shed heat, which is otherwise known as "brake fade." Stopping from exactly 70.0 mph is, obviously, a very difficult thing to do. So, we stop from between 70.0 and 70.5 mph, using a tape switch on the brake pedal so we know exactly when the brake pedal is first touched. Then we correct the distance to a true 70.0-mph start based on the average deceleration from that stop. To avoid any issues with a one-off accomplishment, we report the second-best stop from the group of six as our 70-mph-to-zero distance. On high-performance vehicles, we also measure 100-mph-to-zero distance. The best sports cars wearing high-performance summer tires can stop from 70 mph in the 140-foot range (we measured the new mid-engine Corvette at 149 feet),

The Plaid took 1ft more than a mid-engine Corvette that weights 3700lbs lol.

As long as the brakes can lock up the wheels (which basically every brake system these days can) these are tire/ABS tests, not brake tests.

 

[Gninoked]

Car and Driver Test methodology is 6 braking events



The Plaid took 1ft more than a mid-engine Corvette that weights 3700lbs lol.

Exactly. This is a tire test for most cars, but I get it - they want to do something simple. If they want to actually test the brakes (instead of the tires) they need to do more. A few ideas:

• Repeatedly do 70-0 stops until the distance is 120% of the first stop with a consistent time/accel between stops. Report # of stops. Do 120mph.
• Put brake temp paint on calipers and pads. Do twenty 70-0 stops with consistent time/accel between stops and record the max temp on both.
• Measure pedal input pressure for a .5g stop from 70-0. Repeatedly do stops until input pressure exceeds 150%.

I'm sure we could come up with some more tests that would exercise the various components...

 

[juanmedina]

Exactly. This is a tire test for most cars, but I get it - they want to do something simple. If they want to actually test the brakes (instead of the tires) they need to do more. A few ideas:

• Repeatedly do 70-0 stops until the distance is 120% of the first stop with a consistent time/accel between stops. Report # of stops. Do 120mph.
• Put brake temp paint on calipers and pads. Do twenty 70-0 stops with consistent time/accel between stops and record the max temp on both.
• Measure pedal input pressure for a .5g stop from 70-0. Repeatedly do stops until input pressure exceeds 150%.

I'm sure we could come up with some more tests that would exercise the various components...

It is a braking test:

https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a40255250/short-stop-braking-test/

No one on the street is going to do 5 consecutive 70-0 mph or 100-0 mph stops. The brakes are more than adequate for the street and the new 2023 higher temps pads maybe adequate for track days with 20-15 min sessions.

 

[lbowroom]

when can we buy the new pads through service?

 

[Richbot]

This version of the plaid wasn't designed for track use, that's fairly obvious. They had the '+' for that but decided not to release it for whatever reason. This is the 'muscle' version of the car - and yes it came with the same brakes as the LR which are designed for comfort and long service intervals which is probably the right decision for most (>50%) plaid owners.

I'm curious to see what people think of the new plaid pads. Obviously we've gone way over and above that to get the brakes up to par for track use, but I still believe that a performance pad is all 90%+ of Plaid owners will ever need and if the plaid comes with a bit more maintenance and expense that's just fine. If Tesla has spec'd a pad that covers 'performance' street driving and then offers the CCBs from the "+" as their 'track' option (ignoring that we can get there aftermarket with iron far cheaper!) they've probably done the right thing at the cost of complexity to their product line. Which - 2 years into the run - they can probably handle.

Or, gasp, brake ducts! Where are the diverters? This is like, 0.5% aero hit, at most, if you make them really big and nasty holes in the front bumper. and it's almost no aero penalty at all to stick a $10 piece of plastic on each front lower control arm like Porsche does, and it makes such a big difference done well. BMW got rid of them too and it's infuriating. How is it that General Motors is the only company still putting proper brake cooling on ubersedans? GM who used to put a V8 in a FWD Impala SS and make zero brake improvements, now outdoing the germans. what a world

 

[Richbot]

and the Model S Plaid beats the Taycan Turbo S by 5ft from 70mph

People just don't know what they are talking about. I took my Plaid to autocross 100% stock and I never got a temp warning. I took my car to a track day at Atlanta Motorsport Park and Road Atlanta with Carbotech pads and Motul Fluid and it was fine. If you are not a pro driver that know how to drive the hell out of the car you will be fine. People just like to make noise for no reason.

"PLEASE NOTE: Posts are the copyrighted intellectual property of the author. My words may NOT be quoted outside this forum."

lol

 

[Gninoked]

It is a braking test:

Short Stop: We've Added a New Brake Test to Our Repertoire

No one on the street is going to do 5 consecutive 70-0 mph or 100-0 mph stops. The brakes are more than adequate for the street and the new 2023 higher temps pads maybe adequate for track days with 20-15 min sessions.

I'm hoping/believing you are right and the new pads are good enough for that ~90%+ of drivers whose use (I believe) would be covered simply by a higher performance pad. I'm encouraged by some of the reports in this thread and elsewhere with pad replacement being enough for many.

I don't think there's any chance they are good enough for track sessions based on our experience and testing. One point - the car power won't last 15-20 minutes anyway, we see about 6-8 minutes at max power before the pack starts to get too hot and depending on a number of factors drops to ~50% or so. Realistically the brakes only need to cover that - one warm up lap and 2-3 hot laps. Once the car is at 50% power the amount of friction brake capacity required drops significantly. We've done 30 minute sessions with the car at 50% power and it's still fun and fast, just not obscene like it is at 1000+hp!

 

[Gninoked]

Or, gasp, brake ducts! Where are the diverters? This is like, 0.5% aero hit, at most, if you make them really big and nasty holes in the front bumper. and it's almost no aero penalty at all to stick a $10 piece of plastic on each front lower control arm like Porsche does, and it makes such a big difference done well. BMW got rid of them too and it's infuriating. How is it that General Motors is the only company still putting proper brake cooling on ubersedans? GM who used to put a V8 in a FWD Impala SS and make zero brake improvements, now outdoing the germans. what a world

We've got some racing style sealed brake duct prototypes in production and we are looking forward to doing some back/back testing to see how much they are worth!