Do I need to warm up my brakes/rotors before sending hard ?

[Fiestastix]

Hi,

New here, greetings to the Fiesta community !

Porbably a newbie question but I have a Mk7 ST, stage 2, upgraded rotors on the front and Yelow stuff pads on the front. Rear brakes are full stock. So my question is, I do a bunch of fast driving in mountain roads (we have magnificent ones here in Switzerland) but sometimes I feel like I'm maybe starting my runs (always after at least 15 to 20 minutes of mostly highway) a bit to quickly. And I my braking power fades away during those progressively to the point that I just need to cruise around because yeah, don't wanna die yet. Do you need to have like legit a few warm runs before sending it, regarding the brakes ? My modest guess is that I either kinda burnout the pads to quickly or the rotors (or both) ? Each times it happened to me (only a few times), weather was decently hot, nothing extreme. I also don't start my runs with downhill segments, happened last time going uphill. Knew about warming up your tyres but still kinda new to brake "science"
.
Thanks in advance

 

[Jabbit]

If you upgraded the lines and the fluid, then you might be hitting the limits of the pad. The yellow pads are more of a "sport" pad, not really meant for track/autocross type driving for long stints.

 

[TyphoonFiST]

Follow the EBC break in procedure to bed the pads*

 

[TwiSTFiesta]

Also make sure to turn ESC off if you’re not already. (Push and hold the ESC button for like 3 seconds) Otherwise I believe you’ll cook your rear pads. As I’m told.

 

[WannabeST]

I do a lot of HARD mountain runs. You can see my rotors glowing and pads smoking in my thread.

If you are running a mountain hard you need to be mindful that your tires, brakes, oil etc. will all have a temp they hit where performance will fall off. Especially with a sport type pad. The highway driving time is kind of irrelevant for warming up your brakes. I do 2-3 hour drives to the track but my brakes are far from up to temp because on the freeway you don't really use the brakes much.

You cannot push the pads to the limit for 15-20 minutes in a row. if you want to do a whole 15-20 minutes at good pace throughout the whole thing you need to strategize where you push hard. In time attack most cars will not be able to set a better time after 2 or 3 laps. Even in F1 multi million dollar cars and they can't push hard for 20 minutes straight. Which is why you hear them on the radio saying to conserve tires and when to push.

friendly reminders:
Turn off ESC, leaving it on my overheat and destroy your brakes.
Follow brake in steps for pads or you will see excessive wear.
If you are reaching your brakes limits but not your tires you are probably braking way too much.
Invest in endurance pads if you want to run the full drive without losing brakes.
You will likely need some endurance tires soon as well. Most 200tw tires are going to fall off by 5 minutes of driving