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/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl General Category >> Rubber Side Down! >> EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison /cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1199152819 Message started by Oldfeller on 12/31/07 at 18:00:18 |
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Title: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 12/31/07 at 18:00:18 Note: this tech thread is an ongoing comparison -- it will take a goodly period of time for all the information to be discovered, so be patent -- more is to come over time as it is all discovered. ============================ This is about the different brands and types of premium LOW NOISE brake pads that are available for our bikes and how their performance differs. I will be comparing the premium SBC low noise ceramic pads against the top of the line EBC premium red (FA) cool running carbon graphite kevlar high friction fast race use X grade low noise EBC pads. (please note that EBC makes three other grades that I will not be comparing as they aren't the best low noise pads that EBC has to offer and you shouldn't be using them unless you just simply want to) Now if you can figure out EBC's rating system and disagree with my pick, please educate me some -- I do find the EBC rating system a bit confusing and self-contradicting in some points. In any case, I have the kevlar graphite FA 106 X pads in both thicknesses, the standard 7mm thick FA 106X pad and the 9.7mm "too thick to work on our bike" FA 106/2X pad. I ordered the thicker pads on purpose as they keep showing up whenever our members try to order the correct pad as the PART NUMBERS ARE EXTREMELY ALIKE and internet bike shops like to make mistakes if they get the chance to do so. Since they were on sale I thought I'd sop up over half the worlds supply so they wouldn't keep showing up on your doorsteps by surprise .... ;D LEFT are FA 106/2 "too fat to fit" pads ..... and RIGHT are the "correct for the Savage" small FA 106 pads |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 12/31/07 at 18:56:56 Now, to baseline the bike. I have a standard rotor and a standard stock hydraulic brake line. I have worn out a set of stock Suzuki pads, so my rotor has been worn in and then de-glazed to seat a new set of ceramic SBS pads that I have been running for most of the last calender year. I do brake aggressively with front and rear brakes and I used to make the front brakes squall and squeal like a stuck pig all the time when I used the Suzuki pads (which wore out in 4,000 miles BTW). I was greatly relieved to find that the SBS ceramic pads would actually get rid of the pig squeal, but I think I noticed an increase in the amount of hand force necessary to get equivalent braking to the stock Suzuki pads and I stopped being able to skid the front tire at will at low speeds. SBS seems to have slightly reduced braking effectiveness when dropped into a stock set-up, but at greatly reduced (like practically none) noise levels. (in my experience only, your mileage may vary) The amount of wheel and rotor brake dust from the SBS ceramics appeared to be a good bit less than the Suzuki pads and they wore out thickness-wise much much much less than the stock pads. (I now have nearly 9,000 miles on the bike which is an additional full 4,000 miles Suzuki pad service life's worth of miles that are actually on the SBS pads when you see them). Speaking of thickness, this picture is to clarify the thickness difference between a 106/2X (thicker) and a normal 106X (thin) pad. Makes the standard normal EBC pad look kinda skinny, doesn't it? This is the combo of pads that WILL BARELY go into the stock caliper set up in case you were curious if you could use the thicker pads up if you had gotten a set due to mistake. As Paladin once told us, yes you can mix and match the EBC thicknesses to get a "use up" situation. You would still have to switch out the thinner pad whenever it wore out, but by then the thicker pad would then be a "thinner" pad suitable for matching. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/01/08 at 06:03:00 And this is the stock FA 106X EBC pad compared to the just about a year old SBS pad. Notice please that there isn't much worn off the black painted SBS pad in that year's worth of use (one stock Suzuki pad's entire lifetime). The picture is a bit blurred but you can see that the SBC is still very similar in pad material thickness to the new EBC pad even though the SBC is almost a year old. Not quite as thick, but close. To compare wear rates and wear-pattern-on-rotor using same-same conditions, I guess I'll have to run one pad of each kind at the same time for at least a year or so. But before I do that, I want to put a full set of EBC's on and seat them and then see if I can skid my front tire like I used to be able to do with the Suzuki pads. I need to do this first while I still have the stock IRC tire on the front end of my bike to make it a fair comparison. The stock IRC tire is almost gone so this is the time to do it if I am going to do any realistic post-seating braking comparisons. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/01/08 at 07:54:21 If you have any doubts if you should put anti-squeal compound on the backs of your brake pads, the answer is YES !! put on several thick layers letting it dry completely between layers and before installing on your bike. Using an electric stove eye on warm helps the drying process. Just warm them up good, too much heat and the anti-squeal will bubble up on you (still works ok even if it bubbles, it just looks ugly). If you look closely at the black SBC pads you can see where the engagement surfaces seat into the tough rubbery residue that the anti-squeal compound leaves behind. After a year in use the stuff is still tough and rubbery, it has not gotten hard -- this is how it works to keep the pig squeals away. Well, this batch of pads still has another coating or two to go before its done. Lots of anti-squeal blue juice to keep them little squealing porkers away from your front brakes. And BTW, if you do decide you do want to save yourself some money and interlace in some way way thicker EBC FA 106/2X pads, remember to put the thin pad on the inside (away from the caliper puck) and put the new thick ones on the caliper puck itself. Why? So you can more easily see the thinner pad of course. You can see almost all of the inside pad by just looking through the spokes. The caliper side pad gets obscured by the caliper and all the plumbing, so put the thick one there as you KNOW it isn't going to be wearing out first even if you can't readily see it. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/01/08 at 16:28:19 Being an industrious new-resolution ridden first day of 2008, I decided to swap out my brake fluid, something I try to do on all vehicles at least every other year. I was pumping away when my wife came to the garage to remind me it was time to take her to see National Treasure part 2. So I stopped, cleaned up and took her to the movie. Of course, I forgot to clinch the bleeder nut ---- when I came back to it 4 hours later I had 100% empty brake lines and it wouldn't pump for love or money. Ah Shucks ..... Came in, cleaned up a bit and punched up the list and hit "bleed brakes" into the search function. Read a bit and found this nugget from Savage Greg that deserves being read and remembered for when YOU try to change out your brake fluid or swap to braded hose or have to rebuild a master cylinder or slave cylinder. Savage Greg says ... "Lots of good ideas here, but I know what the problem is. You have too much air in the brake hose and it's hard to get it out. The hose needs to be mostly full of fluid to get any action out of the master cylinder when you pump it. Otherwise you are only pumping air, and no fluid is running out of the reservoir into the hose. Kinda like holding your finger on the end of a drinking straw. (I'm assuming there is nothing wrong with the master cylinder seals) I wish that I had a photo, but let me try to describe a little trick." <continued on next post> |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/01/08 at 16:37:04 Savage Greg says ... "I wish that I had a photo, but let me try to describe a little trick. Since it is hard to pour fluid into the top hose banjo fitting, this will work but it can be a little messy (so cover your tank and fender). Disconnect hose from master cylinder. Get a "ziplock" sandwich bag and cut a small hole in a lower corner. Slide that hole over the hose end and wrap a rubber band around the bag to seal it as tight as possible to the hose. Now, put about a 1/2 cup of fluid in the baggie and close the zipper....follow me? You might need a helper at this point...to hold baggie and hose upright. Then put a container under the brake caliper and open the bleed screw. Now wait. The fluid will run down the hose and out the bleed screw enough to remove most of the air. Don't let the baggie run empty. Then close the screw, grab a rag and remove the baggie from the hose. Put hose on master cylinder without spilling too much fluid from the hose. Now go back to the regular bleeding process. Good luck" This is a GREAT trick, it works exactly as described and actually saves you much much hassle trying to suck or push or use other methods to get your pump back to pumping. You can actually squeeze the sealed baggie and force the brake fluid into the "open at the bottom" system fairly easily. Only thing to add is putting your thumb over the hole on the master cylinder immediately before putting the banjo back together and hitting the brake lever a stroke or two (with a full reservoir of fluid) to get the master cylinder bled properly, fill the banjo recess up and get all the air out of it without putting any air back down your just filled back up hose and slave cylinder. Now that you are pumping again, get her all pumped clean and bubble free, tighten everything back up (reservoir and bleeder valve cover) and then take the bike outside and give it a careful bath to get rid of any paint attacking brake fluid that got accidentally sprayed on anything. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Reelthing on 01/01/08 at 20:54:07 read through it perhaps too quick and missed it - but to me the SBS ceramics caused a fair bit more wear on the rotor than the lower friction EBC - do you intend to contrast this ? I see you write of the wear pattern - I did not notice any patterns - the rotor just went a bit thin |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/02/08 at 03:49:43 I can contrast the SBS and the stock Suzuki pads. Stock Suzuki pads barely changed the surface finish of the rotor while SBS pads wore the rotor in a bit of a "tilted pad" fashion on the caliper side. This went past changing the surface finish into mild actual rotor wear, mainly on the caliper side. This is because the caliper ring does not seat all the way on the pad backing (falls off the side of the pad backing by design) and the anti-squeal film seated the pad crooked for a bit until everything broke in right. On the right side of the rotor (facing front from rider's position) the SBS pads seated flat and wore a nice flat change of surface finish into the rotor. Please remember, I only had the SBS pads on for almost a full year and didn't put a whole lot of wear on the pads. But yes, the ceramic pads do eat into the rotor more than the Suzuki pads did. Reelthing, how many SBS pad changes did you have to roll through to put your bike's original rotor into a required 0.160" service thickness change mode? |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/02/08 at 13:59:32 And here is the right side (side opposite the caliper puck). You can tell there was a texture difference in abrasion action on the caliper puck side during the ceramic pad's duration of service. I would theorize that maybe the caliper puck allows more incidental pad vibration, being a somewhat more mobile element than the "stationary" legs of the opposite side. The puck side may see a difference in non-braking separation distance as it is the part that moves away when you let go of the lever. The opposite housing can move too, but it weighs a lot more and has more friction acting on it. More mobility and relatively more separation space may account for the little waffles in the wear pattern?? Heck, I'm really just guessing here. Who knows? If EBC's really prove out to be less abrasive than SBS's I may not put the SBS's back on at all. But we don't really know that for sure yet, now do we? To quantify this, I guess I had better dig up my old measurement post from when I put the SBS pads on the bike and take some brand new post SBS measurements now so I will have some thing to compare against. I'll use a micrometer since we are dicing a few thousandths worn off the each side of the rotors at this point in time. Measuring untouched steel at rim = 0.1762" considered "as new" Measuring centermost worn portion after wearing out Suzuki pads = 0.1750" (.0012" wear from one year of Suzuki pads) Measuring centermost worn portion after 1 year of SBS pad wear = 0.1706" (.0044" wear from one year of SBS pads) Total wear is 0.0056" at this stage of the game, with the wear showing itself more in the center of the "shiny zone" than to either side of the zone. Clymer manual states the rotor wear limit to be 0.160" so I think a dealer would try to sell me a rotor pretty much right after my first SBS 100% complete pad wear-out change. Heck, I've only got 0.010" of rotor life left ..... :o :o This would surely suck big-time, as Suzuki charges a lot for that rotor, $179.95 plus shipping from Bike Bandit to be exact. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Reelthing on 01/02/08 at 18:59:55 496A6260636A6A6374060 wrote:
I was changing front pads every 3-4k miles - I only used the ceramic for 1 swap before the rotor was at the service limit (a '95 ~ 22k miles if I remember correct) and put on the drilled fancy ebc rotor and ebc organic pads - the sbs are rated HF best I recall - at the time there wasn't any HH that could be found - but arent of the higher friction pads going to wear more on the rotor? |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/02/08 at 22:01:49 High friction pads may be softer and wear out a lot quicker than a long life pad. Like our stock IRC tires, they may be sticky and soft to get the extra grip, but really wear out quick because of that high coefficent of friction grippy effect. High friction pads may wear out quicker than a lower friction longer life pad like the SBS appears to be. Reelthing, what brand were the rest of your three other replacement pad sets? =========================== I'm wondering if I shouldn't sand my rotor some to keep the roughened surface from the SBS pads from screwing up the overall life results on the EBC pads. The original SBS installation got a smoothed deglazed rotor for them to start on, so maybe I should try to smooth up the surface a bit for the EBCs to give them a similar starting point. At least I know the SBS pads CREATED the rough surface that exists now, I won't have the ability to know that about the EBCs unless I sand the rotors to smooth out some of the roughness that is there now. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Savage_Rob on 01/03/08 at 08:39:37 4077777E667A7B7C75120 wrote:
Since this now concerns wear rates on two different items instead of just the pads, another comparison might be one noting any difference in wear rates between the stock LS650 rotor and the aftermarket drilled rotor if both use the ceramic SBS pads. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/03/08 at 14:10:59 I betcha that you ain't a gonna get Reelthing to put SBS ceramic pads on that expensive new rotor of his. He is currently using the EBC organic pads (I am not sure which exact grade and type) for a reason. He done learned that particular lesson already with his last rotor. ======================= OK, I polished the outer (puck side) surface of the rotor (the roughest side with the most scratches and most metal removed by the SBS pads) back to smooth using an orbital finishing sander and fine paper while rolling the wheel by hand. I removed 2 tenths of metal to get it smooth again. Finish is tiny little overlapping circles and will make it very easy to know where the break in wear happens with the EBC pads. Can't do very much about the other side of the rotor since I am limited to hand sanding due to "no room for power equipment" between rotor and spokes. Such is life .... do the best you can with what you got. It is pretty flat and fairly smooth, so we will see what happens to the two rotor sides now with the EBC pads. ======================= SBS pads had seated brownish-tan against the rotor and this was also the color of the brake pad dust left on the caliper. EBC seats a dark black against the rotor and leaves black dust on the caliper. EBC gets very slightly better braking force than the SBS pads -- this is a very "touchy-feelly" observation but I can get the front end to skid very slightly with EBC pads. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Savage_Rob on 01/04/08 at 12:03:05 I bought the same new rotor a few months ago and put SBS ceramic pads on at the same time. The combination stops very well, by the way. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/04/08 at 13:43:52 Did you mike the rotor (or do you still have a virgin material lip at the edge that you can go mike now)? EBC official start point for one set's worth of wear on a Suzuki original "smoothed rotor" is 0.1704" on my bike. You should be able to catch a start point on virgin steel for one SBS set's worth of wear on an EBC rotor. Reelthing should be able to catch a start point on virgin steel for one EBC set's worth of wear on an EBC rotor. This way we get data on both types of pad on an aftermarket EBC rotor and we can get data off my bike for EBC followed by SBS -- then I will likely be in the market for a new rotor myself as I will be well past the wear limit. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Savage_Rob on 01/07/08 at 13:32:38 I can probably find a place to mic mine. I haven't looked. I don't know what good that'd do though. You can't compare wear vs usage in terms or either time or mileage as they really have little to do with braking. You'd almost need to count the hours of use in braking, the speed of the rotor during the braking, and even account for pressure applied. Heck, even ambient temperature probably plays a role in it to some degree. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/08/08 at 04:02:44 We can state one equivalent thing that is generic enough to carry some meaning. "I wore out a set of SBS pads using my driving style and it took 0.00xx off the EBC rotor during a one set of pads service life." Reelthing does the same with a set of EBCs. Will it be absolute, no. Will it be indicative, yes. Right now all I have is an "indication" that SBS wears a relatively rougher surface finish onto a rotor and wears a rotor relatively "more deeply" than stock Suzuki pads do. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Savage_Rob on 01/08/08 at 04:51:03 1231393B383131382F5D0 wrote:
Of what will it be indicative? Driving styles, ride time, and circumstances will not be identical, nor will they even be necessarily similar. If we mounted two rotors on a spindle, each with its own set of pads and put them through a set amount of work and then compared, it would be valid. This isn't anywhere near controlled though. One set of pads may perform three times more the stopping than the other while wearing the rotor only twice as much. All this comparison would show is that it wore the rotor twice as much during its lifetime. It would not indicate that it had performed three times the work with a single set of pads and only twice the wear in the rotor. I'll try to mic my rotor this weekend and post the results but I think it's in vain because this comparison basically has no way of determining how much work was done to cause a given amount of wear on either the pads or the rotor. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/09/08 at 03:52:09 The only test that would meet your criteria is to run one pad of each type on a new rotor and measure the depth of wear on each side independently using a depth gage with the gage's shoe sitting on the unworn lip area and across to the machined area to the inside. Remaining variable would be the difference in actuation force and retraction between puck side and stationary leg side. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by verslagen1 on 01/09/08 at 07:27:40 Anybody know what the rotor is made of? |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/10/08 at 03:20:33 Suzuki is made from stainless steel, can't speak for the EBC. Form of the rotor is a simple piece of de-stressed flat plate that has been laser cut into the rotor shape. Such parts would cost nowhere near $179 to make. A smart fellow could contact fabrication houses for quotes and make us up a batch of "better grade material" rotors for less than $100. Most commonly used rotor stainless is A1S1 420 stainless steel plate, this is a dirt common form of stainless that is available anywhere. One vendor's "esotric stainless" is SVS420JZ If it helped keep the price down, 420 stainless plate would not bother me in the least. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by verslagen1 on 01/10/08 at 07:26:39 Unless it's 400 series SS which is magnetic and rusts, it's not SS. Most auto places say grey iron. And yes, my intention is to cut a custom disk. How many? I don't know. I'm thinking about " Su3uki Sabage . Com " as the cut out. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/10/08 at 13:39:06 That's why I said "better than normal" material -- a truly non-rusting stainless would be very nice, now wouldn't it? Something with some hard to it, maybe some warp resistance. Maybe a little thicker, too. Most folks don't realize that stainless can rust a bit if you give it some granules of rusting material to get the process going. Scouring a stainless steel sink with steel wool is an excellent example of what can happen when you embed rusting steel on to a stainless surface. There may be some ferrous compounds in the brake pad material because the rust I see starting is only on the laser cut "flat" surfaces on my rotor. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by verslagen1 on 01/10/08 at 14:23:57 From Galfer: Laser cut (not stamped) to assure no stress to the material Made of a unique high carbon content steel (420ss) for higher friction Pre-heat treated so that the rotor is less likely to warp Double, parallel disc grinded and diamond finished for perfect flatness Most sites said High carbon steel vs. low carbon OEM disks... That's like selecting a grain of rice from a barrel... I want the white one there. And 420 in my line of work is medium to low carbon steel. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Savage_Rob on 01/14/08 at 10:26:47 The EBC rotor is 0.198" at the area untouched by the pads. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by verslagen1 on 01/18/08 at 19:13:26 Something like this? |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller2 on 01/18/08 at 21:30:09 That's the general idea. Are there any more flowing fonts styles that would look better without getting all sissy looking? All them sharp angles aren't good for stress risers, you know -- cracks like to form in the corners. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by verslagen1 on 01/18/08 at 21:41:06 I know what you mean. But the OEM disk has some fairly thin areas. And this would have a lot more beefy areas. So I don't think it would matter. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/21/08 at 06:35:27 Having done the EBC braking comparisons (and having recovered the braking ability to mildly skid the stock IRC front tire again) I am ready to switch rubber as the old tire is just about shot. What you see below is my experiment for a true long mileage tire, an old style hard rubber construction Metzler rip off that was developed as a touring tire for BMW. The type C287 tire is still made by Ching Shen in our front tire size (but the tire mold itself is so old it is marked 3.50x19 on the side wall). It is still sold by BikeBandit for $30 a tire. (very reasonably priced for a high mileage design) (Does the boy run his tires hard and does he do approach braking when fully heeled over in a turn or what? Note -- his front tire is more worn at the sides than on the top of the crown) |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/26/08 at 13:55:45 Here are some pics of front and rear tire -- all are high mileage hard rubber tires. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/26/08 at 13:56:27 Here are some pics of front and rear tire -- all are high mileage hard rubber tires. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/26/08 at 13:56:51 Here are some pics of front and rear tire -- all are high mileage hard rubber tires. |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by bill67 on 01/27/08 at 00:34:46 i've never had a square tire on a bike,wouldn't that feel funny in a corner |
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Title: Re: EBC vs SBS brake pads -- comparison Post by Oldfeller on 01/27/08 at 06:12:49 Read "Thinkn' & Drinkin'" thread (page 3-4) for full description of exactly how a car tire feels when you are first getting used to it (retraining your hind brain that controls your sensation of balance and other involuntary functions). Some who have done this car tire trick claim to have adjusted easily within a mile or so to how a car tire feels, hey, it took me a week and a half to get completely acclimated. Once this takes place, the tire feels normal to you. (it takes over a month for the car tire to "break in" anyway -- they are drastically more durable in the rubber department) Heck, it took me two days to stop getting "weird" sensations from the new front tire I just mounted -- I was riding "too fast" and rolling "too deep into turns" according to my hind brain. I guess I am just sensitive to that sort of stuff. (my foot pegs agreed with my hind brain BTW -- new tire likes fast sweeper turns a lot more than a stock IRC front tire did). Bill, that rear tire has been on there almost a full IRC rear tire's total life span worth of miles now and I rode it hard the whole time. At least the nubbies are off of it now, they lasted a month or more before they wore off. I might as well decide I like the tire, it is going to be with me for several years yet. |
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