Rhyscar's Toyota Levin - 2zzge Touring car - finished*

[GARDRB]

19 hours ago, Rhyscar said:

Well I’m limited to Wilwood fitment pads… so hoping cheap ones won’t be too shit? 
 

This is based on the fact I’m going to struggle to find a pad that does road driving/sprints and track action. Also I don’t have brake ducts sorted yet, and im looking at going to bigger disc, so unkeen to invest in a $400 pad that’s may be obsolete once I get my setup refined a bit more 

dads run hawks forever in his ae82 with this brake setup and they work great with no cooling, but absolutely rubbish as a road pad. 

Kayne Barrie told me he could get me a really good Hawk for my Wilwoods, but I'm not sure if it's a race or road pad. I assume it was a road pad based on the context of the conversation

[Rhyscar]

2 hours ago, Truenotch said:

I'm running WinMax W1S all round in my Legacy and they're awesome. I can't cook them on the Coronet Peak downhill, they were great at Teretonga and they work like normal pads for regular driving. 

You could probably go for W2s.

Oh man just took a look and the info provided by HPR on winmax is amazing at helping select right compound. Looks like W3 would be an ideal starting option, with W5 a good track option. 

https://paddonrallysport.co.nz/find-your-brakes/

 

[Truenotch]

Email Hayden with your pad shapes (send him the Wilwood diagrams if you have them) and your requirements. He'll probably reply within a couple of hours to give you some options. 

My Legacy pads were about $400 for the set. They've been in the car for 2+ years and are barely showing any signs of wear. 

 

(Get a set for the Lexus next time too).

[GARDRB]

36 minutes ago, Truenotch said:

Email Hayden with your pad shapes (send him the Wilwood diagrams if you have them) and your requirements. He'll probably reply within a couple of hours to give you some options. 

My Legacy pads were about $400 for the set. They've been in the car for 2+ years and are barely showing any signs of wear. 

 

(Get a set for the Lexus next time too).

Looks like Hayden needs a web developer, do we want a group contra deal?

[Rhyscar]

That's great value. I think Nick can get deals on Winmax too. 

The Lexus needs something better anyway.. the DBA street performance pads I've got are terrible. 

 

 

[Hyperblade]

1 hour ago, Rhyscar said:

Oh man just took a look and the info provided by HPR on winmax is amazing at helping select right compound. Looks like W3 would be an ideal starting option, with W5 a good track option. 

https://paddonrallysport.co.nz/find-your-brakes/

 

So many people don't understand brake pads and just go off one temperature number, those graphs are so useful to working out how they behave!.

Most brands have them it's just a matter of hunting around.

Wilwood

Ferodo

 

I run W5 front and W3 rear on the starlet, originally ran W6 on front but because of trying to sort out overheating dropped to W5 which didn't help, so I probably should go back up to W6 again.

I've had no issues with them and they work well when in the right temperature range.

 

[mjrstar]

I'm a bit of a fan of the not particularly well known carbotech, I run an xp8 which is OK from cold, and I find works well when hot. I'm doing short hillclimbs so it's not like multiple laps at a track, with max run time of a bit over 5 minutes, you can use them for limited street use, but I wouldn't commute on them daily.

 

I've had more aggressive pads with greater thermal gradient which I found worse when trying to apply the brake right up to the grip threshold of the tyre. (Endless)

 

I've heard a lot of people talk about how flat the curve is on the pagid pads so it'd be one id consider.

 

You kind of need to consider how agressive the pad is vs you level of booster, and pedal effort as there is no point in have super high coefficient of friction if there is not a wide window of pedal pressure modulation available for different situations.

The inverse also applies, you Dont want a sore leg from having to apply 100kg's of pedal force to get your car to stop either.

 

[Hyperblade]

12 minutes ago, mjrstar said:

I'm a bit of a fan of the not particularly well known carbotech, I run an xp8 which is OK from cold, and I find works well when hot.

I've tried to find a co efficient of friction graph for them and come up short every time.

If they provided one it would be easy to see how they compared to other brands compounds.

But without one your just hoping they will work for a particular setup which is an expensive lesson to find out they don't work.

[mjrstar]

28 minutes ago, Hyperblade said:

I've tried to find a co efficient of friction graph for them and come up short every time.

If they provided one it would be easy to see how they compared to other brands compounds.

But without one your just hoping they will work for a particular setup which is an expensive lesson to find out they don't work.

Oh,  

In my case I drove another honda with them fitted  and a very similar braking arrangement,  the other car was about 60kg lighter and ran a 20mm smaller front disc. They are as dusty as shit, but a pretty kind to rotors.

So I had a pretty decent idea on what pedal feel, ability to modulate and thermal gradient would be like. But get your point if you didn't have prior experience with them.

 

 

 

[Hyperblade]

1 hour ago, mjrstar said:

Oh,  

In my case I drove another honda with them fitted  and a very similar braking arrangement,  the other car was about 60kg lighter and ran a 20mm smaller front disc. They are as dusty as shit, but a pretty kind to rotors.

So I had a pretty decent idea on what pedal feel, ability to modulate and thermal gradient would be like. But get your point if you didn't have prior experience with them.

 

Yep if similar setup you have a good ballpark to work from.

Most of the higher level race compounds from manufacters will be more aggressive on rotors.

Some manufacturers give an idea on how they will wear rotors vs pads, but so hard to compare that stuff across brands.

 

[mjrstar]

On 16/09/2025 at 13:28, GARDRB said:

Kayne Barrie told me he could get me a really good Hawk for my Wilwoods, but I'm not sure if it's a race or road pad. I assume it was a road pad based on the context of the conversation

One thing with certain hawk pads they can be very sparky, which is cool I guess if you want to put on a show, but less cool if you care about the finish on your wheels. Hawk do have some pretty potent compounds if that's your thing.

[Honda Ass Dragger]

Winmax pads are brilliant, the Alcons I have on the Civic came with Hawks - but they were way to aggressive for street driving so I ordered a set of Winmax W3 via PRS and so they they have been great been nearly 3 years and not showing any huge signs of usage work great on street and at track so far

[Rhyscar]

5 hours ago, mjrstar said:

One thing with certain hawk pads they can be very sparky

This is actually a valid concern for doing sprints/targa etc. Starting a bushfire would not be a fun experience!

 

Thanks for all the experience offered, I'll have a chat to PRS and get some for the wilwoods and Lexus. I've heard good things, just haven't used Winmax yet. 

[Rhyscar]

Been so busy lately, haven't managed to update with all the finishing details. It has been a lot, and I've reached the absolute limit of what I can push my body to achieve. Currently paying the price for this with mountains of work that needs attention and sickness to boot. 

 

Oil leak from adapter plate finally fixed! used an adapter from HEL which is a really nice piece. Fits perfectly with 2-3mm clearance and thermostat works great with so much air going through the cooler. If anything, it could do with a 95deg thermostat rather than 84deg. 

 

-12AN lines all fitted up. Still a decent amount of pressure loss, might be the cooler?

 

in preperation for getting on track, ordered some Winmax W5 for the front and decided the old rotors wouldn't be very good. So had to go on a hunt to find a replacement rotor (old part no. discontinued). Found one from a N/A Skyline rear that was similar (1.5mm different offset) and got @Geophy to redrill. RDA don't make the best quality stuff, so will see how long they last. In future I'll need to work towards a tophat/floating disc solution with a larger disc (17" wheels will fit up to 350mm disc!). But thats a problem for another year. 

 

 

I spent an unreasonable amount of time getting into the fuel tank to fish out the nut that had fallen off the bottom of the rollover breather fitting. My experience with the Jaaz plastic tanks is once it gets filled a few times, the shape changes quite a lot an every fitting becomes loose. I forgot to tighten this one last time unfortunately. However, if I ever need to get into the tank again, I promised myself I'm going to redesign the whole bloody thing as its such a difficult job how it is currerntly.. 

 

Added this real nice kevlar Lava mat to bottom of fuel tank from HeatSheild products. Went on nice and looks ace. 

 

I don't have any pics, but lots of other race prep stuff was done alignments, fire extinguisher install completion etc and creating more tyre/guard clearance in the rear. I cut the jammed adjusters off the shocks and got new ones on and modified the tophat so I can lean the shock/tyre over a little more. Seems to have worked a treat. 

 

Next step was load the car up with wife, kids, tools and everything needed for a trackday!

 

 

[Rhyscar]

Nice wee backtrack photoshoot with Aaron Mai. Pretty proud to see it finished* for now anyway. Came up good - def going straight to the pool room!

 

 

I absolutely love the side profile shot of this car!

 

 

 

 

[Rhyscar]

And then we went racing.. going to leave it here with this tease as I don't have time to process incar etc yet, but it was bloody enjoyable and an serene experience to finally drive it on track. 

 

 

 

Filters wanted to fall out on track. Added some tape, but need to make some brackets to hold them in place. Probably be 3D printed?

 

 

Shifter caused some issues. Some operator-related, some equipment. Had to make some fancy bearing retainers for one of the levers. I'd encountered this before with another lever, so I think it's time to look for the next solution to make the shifter more reliable under race conditions. 

 

 

Bedding in new pads was a bit of a mission. Offset of new disc meant no real clearance and had to wait for pad to wear down/stop dragging. This in turn created lots of heat and boiled the 2nd hand fluid (cause thats all you've got at 10:30pm the night before raceday - it was filtered through a rag at least). So rest of the day was dictated by bodgy fluid and pedal going soft which meant I just cruised and took it easy. 

Also continuously cleaning brake dust off white wheels is hard work. haha 

 

The good news is it's way better than it used to be. Ran a 1:23 laptime without really trying on 15yr old pads, and its got heaps more grip, handles better and doesn't get upset over ripple strips. It's a smooth ride with the MCA's thats for sure. 

 

[Rhyscar]

Here's small amount of incar vid. Def not good laps and audio sucks a bit.. but it's proof it made it around the track!

 

Sweet baby jesus 2zzge noises

 

 

[Roman]

Sounds awesome! 

So stoked this all went well.

What sort of speed did you get to on the straight? 

[Rhyscar]

I wasn't really paying attention, but on a few of my laps I put together I was just going into 5th at the end of the straight (while braking extremely early!). 

 

So around 185-190kph I'm picking. With a 4age 170 was max velocity. It's so much faster in a straight line than what it was when 4age powered! Biggest learning was that I needed to leave it in 3rd on Higgins/Esses and use the torque to pull it through. I found having 5000-8800rpm of usable power very useful, and it never dropped out of vtec. 

 

[Rhyscar]

Fresh upload to the tubes. Not quite as shit this time, but still only a couple of warm up laps of some rusty driving on 15yr old brake pads. However it was thoroughly enjoyable and I still cant get over it actually worked and went pretty good for what it is.

Myself and technology failed to capture much more of the day than this, was bloody busy. 

 

Enjoy.