Drum Brake Linings

Phil Maurice touched on an interesting point regarding endeavouring to get
better braking by going from drum to disc, however have any on the list
tried using racing brake linings? In the late 1960s I was heavily involved
in motor cycling and disc brakes were only just becoming available. An
alternative was to use racing brake linings on street and competition
machines. I used Ferodo AM4 linings and found them excellent and on twin
leading brakes gave braking that was comparable to disc.However unless they
had a gradual leading edge ( at least 1 inch and not just a 45 degree cut
on the leading edge ), otherwise the brakes would come on very viciously
and you were in danger of seeing the road at eye level.The graduated
leading edge avoided this difficulty. Has anyone used racing brake linings
rather than converting to disc? Interested to have your comments. - John
Brown

There are several brake linings now being used on the older Jags racing
VSCCA. The favorite lining is called velvet touch. There is also a
carbon-kevlar compound used in circumstances that require a lot of non-fade
braking under heavy heat conditions. The car I pit for uses the velvet
touch and we find them to be fine.  Metallics that we used two years ago
reamed the drums badly although they stopped the car well. - jagman

This is timely - I'd like to keep the drum brakes on our XK140. Do the
velvet touch linings work OK on cold drums? (IME, metallic linings didn't
work well until the drums were hot). Have you a source for them? - TIA,
Evan Gamblin

Velvet touch brake linings do work better because they are a soft woven
lining as opposed to hard solid linings that are common. The do work better
cold but even on many older cars drum brakes are still just that "drum
brakes" and in the case of cars that are not hydraulic..ie. cable
operated.. it can be a scary experience. A year or two ago, we prepared a
Delahaye 135 for the California Mille 1000. The owner completed the event
but said it was a scary experience going down hill not being able to stop
very well....despite using the best linings available- velvet touch- and
doing everything we could to get the cables to operate correctly. Of
course, even the period literature of the time, indicated braking as being
a real problem area on the Delahaye. It takes &%&$&# to drive downhill on a
mountain road using the entire road to get around the curve wondering if
you might misjudge and take the scenic route straight down. It makes you
really
appreciate drivers like Moss and Fangio. :-) - Regards, Hal Rogers, H.D.
Rogers & Sons

If you have any questions or comments send e-mail to: ted@jag-lovers.org
Main Page	Back to the Library