Freakyparts Brembo brakes for track - 345mm or 360mm front rotor kit?

[Maxhouse97]

Anyone have a cooling kit to recommend?

[r4dr]

Anyone have a cooling kit to recommend?

I'm not sure I would daily drive with brake ducts on a 90% street/10% track car. But if you really want to do hoses that you remove/install between track days, Bimmerworld makes backing plates and you can route the hoses from the fog light assembly area.

https://www.bimmerworld.com/E46-M3-Brake-Cooling-Backing-Plate-Set-2001-2002-2003-2004-2005-2006.html

What's more intriguing to me, but I don't know of any real-world reviews, is Vorshlag's deflector plate kit:

https://vorshlag-store.com/collections/bmw-e46-brakes/products/vorshlag-bmw-e46-m3-brake-cooling-deflector-kit

I run their equivalent product on a Shelby GT350 and they are a pinch to install/uninstall. Probably faster than changing brake pads, and you don't have to fuck with hoses.

[Maxhouse97]

Awesome thanks, I love the Vorshlag kit. Very similar to GT3 brake ducts. I will try these.

[Maxhouse97]

Update here - I went with the 360mm FreakyParts kit and rear 996 on ZCP rear rotors. Here are some initial thoughts:

- Install was smooth, although with a caliper designed for a 28mm wide rotor on a 30mm e90 rotor is a tight fit. Maybe 1 mm clearance on either side. That being said it spun freely once installed.
- I was worried about the stock master cylinder not being able to handle the larger pistons, leading to long pedal travel or squishy feel. This was not the case, pedal feels amazing and is tight. It does loosen a bit when the brakes get really hot, but much better than the old stock system.
- I was surprised by one downside of the 360mm kit … the pad doesn’t reach all the way to the inner diameter of the rotor, thereby exposing you to a potential rust ring. It’s probably 3mm wide, not much but there. Options are paint it silver or black or just live with it. Right now I’m living with it. Rears have the same problem but I went with front Boxster pads to eliminate this.
- Other than the above the only current downside is the brakes make a bit of noise/ hum when you get on them hard and they heat up. Still not sure if this is caused by the pads/rotor design or if maybe the front rotor expands slightly over it heats up, causing some interference. The rotor surfaces are fairly clean, so if there is interference it’s not significant. My hope is this goes away as the rotors continue to break in. I will test these on the track in the spring and report back.
- Upon installation I did a bathroom scale check with the stock system and they seemed similar (lighter caliper offset with heavier rotor), but the ride is a little firmer, so I suspect the fronts are a little heavier. Worth it for me to have a more heart capable system, something you can’t avoid with larger steel rotors.


Overall the package looks OEM and wonderfully purposeful. Brake feel is great, and much better than stock, and the 360mm rotors should really help counteract brake fade at the track with their ability to act as a larger heat sink. Feel the brakes finally lives up to the rest of the car (the amazing engine and slightly heavier weight of the e46 B.S.s lighter cars). Gives me much more confidence everywhere. And for $900 for the front kit plus lifetime rotors from FCP I think it’s hard to beat for a OE BBK.

[r4dr]

The E9X M3 front rotor has a 65mm annulus, and the D1001 pad is 62mm so your estimate of 3mm is spot on. Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any pads that are a taller version of a D1001, so you won't be able to do the same trick as with the rear.

My notes say the E9X stock rotor weighs 22.4 lbs up front, and a quick Google search says the E46 M3 CSL rotor weighs 19.1 lbs. You're looking at roughly 10% more thermal mass by using the E9X rotor.

I appreciate you posting the review. The Freakyparts kit has sat in my garage since Black Friday 2020, and I really need to get it on my car. I'm planning to use it with the 345x28mm CSL rotor size, however. Is your car a pre- or post-2003.5 car? I want to say the master cylinder switched along with the DSC but it's been so long since I looked into that.

What pads did you go with? If anyone is trying to match the front and rears with a 996 kit, I would look up Textar pads from FCPEuro for street use. The 8J TT RS (earlier one) uses the D1001 pad and there's a Textar OEM application for that.

[Maxhouse97]

My car is an 04. The kit came with Brembo front pads, and I purchased Textar pads for the rear (again front Boxster pads). I haven’t made a decision yet on track pads but you’re right on the TT RS application, so I should be able to buy off of FCP.

Freakyparts did relay that there is a Nurburgring company that uses E46M3s, and that they chose to use the e90 rotor setup for more robustness. I think for a more street biased setup up the CSL rotor size would be great (not that the CSL setup wouldn’t suffice, it’s just an element of having more margin).

[Cronenberged]

Anyone have a cooling kit to recommend?

Hard Motorsports kit is nice and you retain the full turn in your wheels.

https://www.hardmotorsport.com/hard-motorsport-bmw-e46-m3-brake-cooling-low-profile-duct-kit-pair/

[Pklauser]

Maxhouse97 Did you end up running that Vorshlag brake duct kit? Curious what your impressions are there. I'm debating fabbing something similar myself, but I'm not sure how effective it will be vs traditional ducting hoses. Seems like the air is much less directed towards the hub, and is more just getting thrown at the inner rotor surface.

[Maxhouse97]

So I had my first track day with this set up, and they performed excellent. No fade, no bleeding, no worries. Exactly as I was hoping for. And I was on NCM, a track that has a lot of fast corners that are hard on brakes. It was relatively cool, but I think they will perform the same in warmer temperatures. The only change I would make would be to potentially add more aggressive pads in the rear to move a little bias to the rear. But the fact that I stopped thinking/worrying about my brakes says a lot compared to the stock brakes I dealt with before.

No I was not using any brake ducts, my hope was having the 360 x 30 mm rotors up front would eliminate the need for that … so far so good.

[Nate047]

What do we think is the best bet for pads on these, matching up to a 996 rear? I'm trying to see if there is a good one on FCP. The D1001 pad is used on the TT RS and also Volvo S60 R, both of which FCP obviously has parts for. Trying to find a track pad, and a street pad option, that are offered in the same compound for a combination of models to get matching front and rear pads.

[Mr.wReckless]

Went with this 360mm kit and 996 rears, fitted Girodisc for the E9x M3 front discs though. And they add further to the thickness of the disc to 32mm, up from 30 of the regular E9x disc. They still fit, but I had to do some gentle massaging to the internal elbow of the caliber for the disc to clear.

Fitted Ferodo DS2500 pads all around, and ended up getting steering wheel vibration on braking, so upon speaking with customer service at Girodisc and some googling it seems the Ferodos are known for leaving pad deposits. So I've swapped to a regular, basic Brembo pad. Brembo also do a HP2000 upgraded pad, but the price is also severely upgraded. I see people also rate the Pagid RSL29 pad, which is also pricey, but possibly a good choice?

Depends on your application, but I'm not sure I would recommend the Ferodos based on my opinion tbh. Unsure about the compound on the Brembo's as their website doesn't mention.

Regards

[Maxhouse97]

So update on my end, had a track stay in 95 degree heat … unfortunately not the same result. Had softening of the brake pedal deep into the runs. My car is stock and heavy, so with the heat I’m not surprised (guys with $3k BBKs had cooling and I had none). My next steps will be SRF fluid (cheap insurance, available at FCP, was using Motul 600 before) and the Vorshlag cooling kit. I did not order it yet and still have my dust shields up front, so will rectify both those. I’m hoping these three things will solve my issue. I still think the mod was worth it, and glad I went with the E90 rotors. I can’t imagine 32mm wide, I’ve been told the caliper was originally designed for 28mm. But more power to you if you got it to fit. The 3mm rust ring is a non-issue for me, it blends into the center of the rotor.

As for pads, I used Hawk DTC-60 up front. Could not find these on FCP originally BUT I just searched via the S60R and found them! Thank you for mentioning that, I have done hours of research trying to back calculate what European cars had the D1001 pad shape. Power of this forum.

On the rears, my plan was to use DTC-70 for the brake bias, but FCP only has the 60s. So sticking with those (unless someone finds a dutiable replacement on FCP like the above for Boxster non-S). 😊

[Pklauser]

Great find on the S60R pads at FCP! Their pads are part of why I'm still stock.

Interesting to hear you're still wrestling with heat, I just ran DTC-70s at Watkins Glen in upper intermediate at about 90F ambient with Motul 600, no cooling, and didn't have any fade issues. The same setup on that track with Carbotech XP10s was fading, but the 70s seemed to hold on.

[Maxhouse97]

Interesting, thanks for that maybe I’ll try DTC-70 on both. That could be a fourth element to mitigate the fade.

[r4dr]

The E9X Girodiscs are only 30mm, but with manufacturing tolerances you might have been on the plus side of that (extra life for free?). If they are 32mm, there would be no way you would squeeze them between the pad locating pins on the caliper short of machining them down 1mm each, as that caliper can only take a 30mm disc (+/- the tolerances on the caliper, as well...). Keep in mind that dial calipers can be inaccurate when measuring rotor thickness.

Within the Girodisc rotors, the E9X rotor has a little less than 10% more thermal mass than the E46 one. I would guess that either one would need cooling on a stock-weight car on 200TW+ tires, especially on a brake-heavy track. My other note is that it can be easy to overbrake with an aggressive pad like the DTC-60 or 70, but I think an ideal system would be able to handle that heat regardless. I've had the Vorshlag cooling plates on my GT350 for a while and they seem to work pretty well.

I think this Freakyparts kit plus the 345mm E46 rotor and some cooling is a great track day setup for relatively cheap. The D1001 pad shape is one of the cheapest and most common shapes out there, no Euro or P-car tax on it. Also, the E46 rotor is better set up to take that pad as the unswept area across the E9X rotor will lead to a radial temperature difference under hard use. Whether that affects longevity or not in any noticeable way in this specific case, I have no idea.

I'm helping my friend set his new Z4M up for the track, and I think my Freakyparts kit will go on that car with Girodisc rotors and race pads. I'm curious to see how it performs.