Model S Plaid Brakes Are Terrible!

[Richbot]

Does running it in "Sport" or whatever lower power settings help with track thermals? Obviously the brakes would thank you, but I'm curious, or if that's not even an option with track mode engaged I guess you have to self-limit with your right foot. Also curious if capping your top speed at say 125 or so, and just getting there REALLY quickly, would help squeeze a whole session out of it. This is what the dudes with the EV sports racer do to lengthen stints so you're not fighting the wind AND thermals at the same time

Model 3 is probably smarter, but doing it in a Plaid is tugging hard on the stupid part of me if I decide to jump out of club racing. It's a shame the dual motor S doesn't get track mode and probably never will. STill way too much power for economical track use, but maybe the battery would be a little better matched to the motors/rotors/thermal management for longer sessions

EDIT: Derp I guess you answered my question. That's wild that it will run a whole session at 50% power. That's about 500% more power than you'd have at the end of a 30 minute session in a Performance, lol

 

[Gninoked]

Does running it in "Sport" or whatever lower power settings help with track thermals? Obviously the brakes would thank you, but I'm curious, or if that's not even an option with track mode engaged I guess you have to self-limit with your right foot. Also curious if capping your top speed at say 125 or so, and just getting there REALLY quickly, would help squeeze a whole session out of it. This is what the dudes with the EV sports racer do to lengthen stints so you're not fighting the wind AND thermals at the same time

Model 3 is probably smarter, but doing it in a Plaid is tugging hard on the stupid part of me if I decide to jump out of club racing. It's a shame the dual motor S doesn't get track mode and probably never will. Still way too much power for economical track use, but maybe the battery would be a little better matched to the motors/rotors/thermal management for longer sessions

No - in our testing with software from last year (can't say for sure with current but we believe nothing has changed... yet!) when you go to track mode it is full power. We have recommended to our Tesla contacts that they should provide a slider for power just like they do for balance and VSC in track mode. They were receptive - even stating they thought the exact same thing - but suggestions have to go through product planning etc. so hard to say if that will ever show up. The car even at 50% is a ton of fun and still very fast but consumes less of everything and is easier to drive/learn and will do a 30 minute session without running into any limits.

I can say this for sure because Mountain Pass Performance/Sasha have installed a Motec and software in our car and we have control of the power more than what Track Mode provides. We've played with Sasha's control systems to try to minimize lap times over a multi-lap run but also to understand the limits of the car/powertrain/pack.

 

[Richbot]

That's fantastic news. I am having a hell of a time finding any war stories from people who are out there doing the thing, who aren't also selling a thing, especially on track use and longevity. Thank you for the marketing-spin-free feedback. Would you say track mode's other functions operate about like Model 3's, in that the car is relatively permissive at certain ends of the VSC/balance envelope? Fun police aren't too onerous?

I'm willing to do weird crap nobody else is doing, but I'm not willing to be the very first person to find out it sucks, lol

 

[juanmedina]

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!

My car didn't get hot at Road Atlanta unil the afternoon after supercharging because I forgot to put in track mode right after but I was able to get two sessions at what it seemed like full power. At Atlanta Motorsports Park the battery never got even close to hot but that track is not fast but technical. I am not that good of a driver so maybe I am not pushing the car that hard but I did spined out once lol.

 

[bhzmark]

If they want to actually test the brakes (instead of the tires) they need to do more.

Read their testing methodology. They do do repeated tests in quick succession and throw out the best one. It is a brake test that is more than adequate to test enthusiastic street driving. And optimizing your brake pads for high temperature use can compromise cold temperature use. With regen EV brakes are almost always cold in normal day to day driving --especially in an emergency stop from highway speeds where you might not have touched the brakes for the last 50 miles and they are cold. The brakes should be optimized for that most likely heavy braking scenario.

 

[MarcG]

Just one data point: with aftermarket rotors from RB and pads from G-Loc on my Plaid, I was still measuring over 1400ºF after just a few laps on a proper track (Laguna Seca, Sonoma Raceway, Buttonwillow) *including* a cooldown lap.

With my Model 3 Performance, I barely hit 1000ºF with identical conditions. 25% less weight and less top speed definitely helped.

I was tempted by CCB but it's so expensive and requires 21" wheels. Ended up going with a 1300-lb race car (Ariel Atom 3R) and selling all aftermarket wheels/tires/brakes. Plaid is great at a lot of things, just not tracking.

 

[Gninoked]

Just one data point: with aftermarket rotors from RB and pads from G-Loc on my Plaid, I was still measuring over 1400ºF after just a few laps on a proper track (Laguna Seca, Sonoma Raceway, Buttonwillow) *including* a cooldown lap.

With my Model 3 Performance, I never hit 1000ºF with identical conditions. 25% less weight and less top speed definitely helped.

I was tempted by CCB but it's so expensive and requires 21" wheels. Ended up going with a 1300-lb race car (Ariel Atom 3R). Plaid is great at a lot of things, just not tracking.

Yeah - we are regularly hitting 850c and peaking at 900C (1650f) after 2 laps on a track before dropping due to power dropping/pack getting too hot. After a cooldown lap we were down to 350C, (650F) so 1400 is sky high after a cooldown! That said the performance of our brakes was still good - the pads and rotors that can handle it. At Barber everyone was saying in full daylight they could see the rotors glowing haha.

One difference - we are measuring live on the track continuously via sensors connected to the Motec - see Sasha's other posts for more information on that setup.

With the brake ducts and good air from the front of the car we are hoping to see minimum 100C difference at peak. We are also doing some work to see if we can extend the power by helping cool the battery more.

An Ariel is a proper track weapon for sure. It would be a ton of fun to run the two against each other somewhere and see the differences! We are committed to the Plaid for now and running it in competitions to try to beat all the ICE cars. (I say that but we also regularly work on and run RX7's.)

 

[Gninoked]

Read their testing methodology. They do do repeated tests in quick succession and throw out the best one. It is a brake test that is more than adequate to test enthusiastic street driving. And optimizing your brake pads for high temperature use can compromise cold temperature use. With regen EV brakes are almost always cold in normal day to day driving --especially in an emergency stop from highway speeds where you might not have touched the brakes for the last 50 miles and they are cold. The brakes should be optimized for that most likely heavy braking scenario.

No debate on any of what you said. They aren't doing enough to test the brakes is my opinion. It's still mostly a tire test. Agree with your supposition that Tesla can and should optimize around their customers greatest use. I think they got the balance a little off with the original setup - I'm hoping the new pads are more in the sweet spot. I am also appreciative that Tesla has and continues to configure the car so that we can benefit from modifying it and they continue to accept feedback!

 

[Gninoked]

My car didn't get hot at Road Atlanta unil the afternoon after supercharging because I forgot to put in track mode right after but I was able to get two sessions at what it seemed like full power. At Atlanta Motorsports Park the battery never got even close to hot but that track is not fast but technical. I am not that good of a driver so maybe I am not pushing the car that hard but I did spined out once lol.

I definitely am not going to accuse anyone of being slow... AMP is an interesting one as you say because of all the off camber, long corners, etc. Would be interesting to do some modeling of 'On time' vs offtime at max power to see how many laps I'd expect a car at max attack to be able to achieve.

Spinning can be indicative of learning the limits...

 

[Gninoked]

That's fantastic news. I am having a hell of a time finding any war stories from people who are out there doing the thing, who aren't also selling a thing, especially on track use and longevity. Thank you for the marketing-spin-free feedback. Would you say track mode's other functions operate about like Model 3's, in that the car is relatively permissive at certain ends of the VSC/balance envelope? Fun police aren't too onerous?

I'm willing to do weird crap nobody else is doing, but I'm not willing to be the very first person to find out it sucks, lol

Yes, in general it does the same stuff. For sure it will let you spin. I have done it once. (still got 6th of 84 in the session though lol)

Yes if you watch Sasha's braking issue video, we are out on the bleeding edge. (That specific is Tesla/Bosch have since resolved.)

There is still something wrong with the software in the wet/low grip situations. Seems like it could be related to the virtual diff in the rear given there are 2 motors. Hoping that has been resolved, we are hearing good things.

 

[Richbot]

I

No debate on any of what you said. They aren't doing enough to test the brakes is my opinion. It's still mostly a tire test. Agree with your supposition that Tesla can and should optimize around their customers greatest use. I think they got the balance a little off with the original setup - I'm hoping the new pads are more in the sweet spot. I am also appreciative that Tesla has and continues to configure the car so that we can benefit from modifying it and they continue to accept feedback!

they also said, in the parts of the tests that spec sheet racers don’t read, that brakes got overheated on a backroad, and soft after their brake test. Don’t get the impulse to apologize for a company’s misjudgments just because owning the product. I’m here to fix the broken or poorly engineered crap on all my cars. Have to be clear eyed to find the way to solutions, as you clearly are, but jeez this thread I really need to turn off notifications. They screwed up an important but ultimately minor thing about a tesla, (and are trying to fix it) it’s ok to admit that without having to turn in your car, in fact, there’s a whole industry built around fixing stuff like this!

It’s ok to point out areas where other manufacturers (with no excuses to get it wrong after a century or more in business) are more successful, they also have flaws, that we bitch about on their marque forums!

Anyway.

Thanks for the insights on plaid’s track mode it might cost me a lot of money soon lol

There’s a 2023 demo car at my center for $10k off. Somebody please buy it

 

[Gninoked]

Now in metal!

 

[NeuroRad]

Has anyone yet tried the new brembo steel kit?

 

[MFrunkerOG]

Had the wheels off this last week for the summer tire switcharoo!

I took a look at the brake clips and they weren’t really keeping the pads apart evenly top and bottom. Had to do some adjustment of the clips to really get them on the pad extension.

Much better feel now. Those clips are silly design - barely holding on by 1/16of an inch on the pad extender

 

[Sam1]

Just one data point: with aftermarket rotors from RB and pads from G-Loc on my Plaid, I was still measuring over 1400ºF after just a few laps on a proper track (Laguna Seca, Sonoma Raceway, Buttonwillow) *including* a cooldown lap.

With my Model 3 Performance, I barely hit 1000ºF with identical conditions. 25% less weight and less top speed definitely helped.

I was tempted by CCB but it's so expensive and requires 21" wheels. Ended up going with a 1300-lb race car (Ariel Atom 3R) and selling all aftermarket wheels/tires/brakes. Plaid is great at a lot of things, just not tracking.

RB rotors are trash. I deformed a set of them on a model 3 performance to the point where the machine shop resurfacing them could see the poor metallurgy splotches showing through the rotors and suggested that I not put them back on.

 

[MFrunkerOG]

Just one data point: with aftermarket rotors from RB and pads from G-Loc on my Plaid, I was still measuring over 1400ºF after just a few laps on a proper track (Laguna Seca, Sonoma Raceway, Buttonwillow) *including* a cooldown lap.

With my Model 3 Performance, I barely hit 1000ºF with identical conditions. 25% less weight and less top speed definitely helped.

I was tempted by CCB but it's so expensive and requires 21" wheels. Ended up going with a 1300-lb race car (Ariel Atom 3R) and selling all aftermarket wheels/tires/brakes. Plaid is great at a lot of things, just not tracking.

@MarcG - Which Gloc compound do you have?

 

[MarcG]

@MarcG - Which Gloc compound do you have?

R12

 

[MFrunkerOG]

R12

My R12 front and rear are getting shipped today! The MPP rotors should keep things cooler than 1400

 

[bhzmark]

Those of you who own a Plaid, is it just me or are the brakes terribly subpar for the power of this car? I was driving at a high rate of speed on the Interstate and had to aggressively apply the brakes only to find out that they are very weak.

Anyone else agree and more importantly, have any over you replaced to improve upon the braking experience?

Thanks!

Funny that the OP on this thread was just dead wrong.

I can get how this nonsense gets perpetuated on Twitter or Youtube that has a bunch of Tesla haters, but you would think the more informed population on this forum would know better.

Car and Driver does repeated braking tests from 100 mph. They throw out the best/shortest test and report the next best (or maybe average, I forget — they wrote an article on this).

The stock Plaid, before the recent upgrade, and without the track package, braked better/shorter than the lighter BMW M5 CS with carbon ceramic. see below. The Plaid tied the BMW from 70 mph and braked 10 FEET SHORTER THAN THE BMW M5 CS FROM 100 MPH.

It is simply false, and clearly documented that it is false, that the stock Plaid brakes are bad for braking at high speeds. Indeed Plaid brakes seem to be optimized for 99.9% of the highest priority use — stopping at high speeds when cold or barely warm. E.g., when cruising on the highway, rarely braking as you use regen for any needed decel. so when you might have to do an emergency stop from high highway speeds, your brakes may be stone cold, and yet they have to stop a lot of weight fast. And Tesla brakes stop the Tesla faster than the BMW brakes stop the BMW M5 CS when cold/merely warm from 100 mph.

Try to brake when cold with race track pads — they will suck when cold if truly optimized for track sustained high heat usage.

Of course, if you do track your Plaid, you will have more combined weight and power than anything else on the track and you will be getting your brakes massively hot in no time. You absolutely must put race specific brake components, even pads that might suck when cold, on your Plaid at the track, unless you want to make a stupid video of how brakes optimized for cold highway emergency stops suck when overheated at the track.

In addition to the BMW below (which had wider front tires but still stopped longer), C&D tested the Taycan only from 70, not from 100 —- Taycan was 9 feet longer than the Plaid from 70 — probably even worse from 100.

 

[URBAN LEGEND]

Funny that the OP on this thread was just dead wrong.

I can get how this nonsense gets perpetuated on Twitter or Youtube that has a bunch of Tesla haters, but you would think the more informed population on this forum would know better.

Car and Driver does repeated braking tests from 100 mph. They throw out the best/shortest test and report the next best (or maybe average, I forget — they wrote an article on this).

The stock Plaid, before the recent upgrade, and without the track package, braked better/shorter than the lighter BMW M5 CS with carbon ceramic. see below. The Plaid tied the BMW from 70 mph and braked 10 FEET SHORTER THAN THE BMW M5 CS FROM 100 MPH.

It is simply false, and clearly documented that it is false, that the stock Plaid brakes are bad for braking at high speeds. Indeed Plaid brakes seem to be optimized for 99.9% of the highest priority use — stopping at high speeds when cold or barely warm. E.g., when cruising on the highway, rarely braking as you use regen for any needed decel. so when you might have to do an emergency stop from high highway speeds, your brakes may be stone cold, and yet they have to stop a lot of weight fast. And Tesla brakes stop the Tesla faster than the BMW brakes stop the BMW M5 CS when cold/merely warm from 100 mph.

Try to brake when cold with race track pads — they will suck when cold if truly optimized for track sustained high heat usage.

Of course, if you do track your Plaid, you will have more combined weight and power than anything else on the track and you will be getting your brakes massively hot in no time. You absolutely must put race specific brake components, even pads that might suck when cold, on your Plaid at the track, unless you want to make a stupid video of how brakes optimized for cold highway emergency stops suck when overheated at the track.

In addition to the BMW below (which had wider front tires but still stopped longer), C&D tested the Taycan only from 70, not from 100 —- Taycan was 9 feet longer than the Plaid from 70 — probably even worse from 100.


View attachment 925877

One time under heavy braking they work. After that they suck. Tesla even offers CCBS but for those that brake more than once on the highway.