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      03-28-2020, 10:41 PM   #47
Powerslide
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Drives: 2018 F80 ZCP
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Chicago Illinois USA

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I've had a very interesting winter this year (which was my 6th winter in the F80 platform). I bought my first F80 in Sept. 2014 - and traded to a 2018 ZCP in Nov. 2017. Here's my history with brake judder:

Dec. 2014 - March 2015: Slight vibration in the pedal/steering wheel started in December - got worse until about Feb. '15. Dealer said "warped" rotors. I didn't have any reason to question that at the time, so the rotors and pads were replaced under warranty.

March 2015 - Dec. 2015: No problems with brakes whatsoever. Drove car pretty aggressively for this entire timeframe.

Dec. 2015 - March 2016: Same vibration started mildly in December and got worse as the winter progressed. Same diagnosis from dealer - warped rotors. Rotors and disks replaced under warranty.

March 2016 - Dec. 2016: No problems with brakes whatsoever. Tracked car a few times that summer by switching to Pagid RS29 pads. Swapped back to stock pads in between HPDE's. Everything remained fine - no judder whatsoever.

Dec. 2016 - March 2017: Darn brake judder returned again. Rotors and pads replaced under warranty.

March 2017 - December 2017: Tracked my car at a few HPDE's in summer of 2017 - again with Pagid RS29's. No problems with brakes whatsoever during this time. In November, traded my 2014 F80 for my current 2018 F80 ZCP.

December 2017 - March 2018: Yet again - brake judder started coming back in late December - worsened until rotors and pads replaced yet again under warranty in March, 2018.

March 2018 - March 2019: Same as summer before - no problems - HPDE's done with RS29's. HOWEVER - I kept my RS29's in for the winter (missed a few opportunities to swap pads when weather mild - cold weather persisted - so I ended up just keeping the RS29's in all winter. NO PROBLEMS WITH BRAKE JUDDER FOR FIRST WINTER WITH F80!! The only problem is that I was wearing my rotors down much faster with the RS29's.

March 2019 - October 2019: As usual - several HPDE's during this time with Pagid RS29's - swapped out to stock pads in between events. No problems with brake judder.

October 2019 - March 2020: FIRST WINTER WITH STOCK PADS AND NO BRAKE JUDDER!! .

So - why not any problems the past 2 winters and NEVER any problems in the summer?

ANSWER - PART 1: I personally believe that the salt on the roads in the winter makes the pads more susceptible to pad deposit. Every spring/summer/fall I was always much harder on the brakes, and obviously while driving in much hotter conditions than in winter (especially considering how massively colder it is in Chicago in the winter vs. the summer) - so if the pad deposits are purely a function of heat - one would think that the problem would manifest more in the summer, rather than exclusively in the winter. I'm not an engineer or scientist - but the fact that I had no problems in the winter of 2018-2019 when leaving the Pagid RS29's in only "validated" my suspicion even more.

ANSWER - PART 2: Given that the winter of 2019-2020 was the first winter where I did not have problems with brake judder on the STOCK pads - why no problem this time, but consistent problems for the other 4 winters on stock pads? My guess is two-fold: (1) whenever we had snow on the streets that was more than an inch deep - I drove with the traction control FULLY OFF. I actually learned that I was able to control the car very well by being very gentle and gradual with the throttle, and only using the throttle to drift or powerslide my way through situations when the MDM or DSC would have cut too much throtttle (my HPDE experience seemed to be paying off). DISCLAIMER - I'm not saying that traction control fully off in the snow is necessarily the best/safest for most or all drivers - just saying that this winter - it worked for me and I felt in control of the car at all times - while being careful to never be aggressive with the throttle.

My guess is that in past winters while driving with DSC in the fully-on or MDM position, I was probably being too aggressive with the throttle, and whereby the DSC system was causing far more often/rapid brake applications, which in turn was probably overheating the pads and causing pad deposits way more than I realized (with the salt possibly contributing further). I know there were other times in the past where I drove very gently in the snow in MDM mode - yet I'd come home from a short drive and pad deposits were clearly visible on the rotors (whereas I cannot recall even a single instance in the spring/summer/fall where I saw any pad deposit on the rotors after what I thought was far more aggressive driving).

Interesting that the only thing that was "different" this past winter versus others was driving in the snow with DSC fully off. Is that in fact the explanation for why it didn't happen this winter on the stock pads? Conversely, does this establish that road salt and/or DSC/MDM in the winter creates a greater propensity for pad deposits to build up and lead to brake judder? Again - I don't know - but I'd be curious to hear from those who have had brake judder problems to chime in as to whether their problems with judder arose under similar or different conditions versus my situtations...
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