EBC Bluestuff review after hard track abuse
 

My experience of EBC blues after some very very hard abuse at Snett 300 yesterday…

I’ve used Performance Friction Z pads for road and track duty over the past few years and whilst I’ve been more than happy with the on track capabilities of the Z’s, the on road (cold bite) has been very poor almost to the point of being dangerous!
Cue the group test of Andy Freemans EBC blues. Fortunately I was given a set to try out and up until yesterday I’d only used them for fast road and 20 minutes at Brands.
My first impressions were that the cold bite and sheer stopping power was head and shoulders above the PF Z’s. Very impressed indeed!.

So, onto yesterdays day at Snetterton 300.

I typically stay out for 20-30 minutes on track and thrash the knackers off my car without any mechanical sympathy whatsoever!
Whilst the Z’s took a while to get up to temp and gave me some confidence the Blues were bang on the money from the start and needed very little warming up to perform.
But, after approx 15+ miles of very hard non stop track abuse they started to fade slightly and needed to cool down before getting back to their best.
There have been plenty of comments on here about brake judder and pad deposit left on the discs from the Blues, but not once have I had this problem with them, where as with the Z’s I’ve had a nightmare with judder and trying to remove to deposit has been a right royal pain in the ass!

PF Z deposit on discs…

Attachment 55774

Old PF Z pads…

Attachment 55775

So, back to the EBC Blues.

My overall impression is that as a fast road and occasional light track pad the Blues are fantastic value for money and pretty much do all that is asked of them with no downside whatsoever.
But when given some real abuse (and I mean some heavy abuse) they don’t cut the mustard compared the to Z’s.
Pics…

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Obviously the Blues have smeared quite a bit and started to crumble in places but they still did a good job of stopping me, although two track days would be their limit where as the Z’s have previously last me six+ hard track days.
I look forward to trying the EBC Orangestuff at some point, although they will have to be real good to match the hard race capabilities that PF offer.

And a vid of me being given a driving lesson yesterday from a rather special car.
Just need to fit a flux capacitor with an unobtainium crystal drive and i'll be faster :lol1:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CRXSUK6KcE

So good you had to say it twice:D

Interesting view and certainly swaying towards the bluestuff when I get my brake upgrade squared - they seem to be up to what I want for now. Noted the comments about serious abuse and should I start doing more than the occasional track day I will consider the alternatives:thumb:

Interesting info, thanks.

Why have you written it twice though? :wonder:

Blues for me have worked better than DS2500s
I have always been a big fan of Pagid.
So once the EBC Blues wear out I will see how they compare to Pagids

(Godspeed 335mm set up on a high powered classic)

I've got the orange stuff on just now seem v good at fast road haven't had the chance to take them on track but the box does say

For race and track use only lol

Are those Godspeed discs with the pf pads ?

Steve

The discs are DBA 4000 and have been faultless throughout.
Interested to hear your findings on the orangestuff Steve.

I have Orange stuff to go on next week :) I can't claim to have cained my blues as much as that lol. Good effort :D :notworthy

I am still so impressed with the your Blue's! Over and over i have been doing 60 to 0mph stops which is more than you should ask of a set of pads. *I can get away with between 5 and 8 full blown dead stops before i feel a bit of fade and then that too passes once cooled again. *I have given these pads zero mechanical sympathy and the only thing they have thrown back is a little brake dust! *Only one mild track day so far but with no serious heating yet.

Hi iv got the godspeed discs on my 2004 sti. Had alot of brake issues in the past but iv rebuilt my calipers and im ok now.

Iv got the kevlar pads that godspeed recommended for an upgrade. Get a small bit of temperature in them and they are fading fast. I do normal driving mainly, but the odd few times i like to go fast and do some big stops like 130 down to 20mpg. I cant do that with these pads, they cant handle the heat. I dont do track days but might do the odd one soon, but i wont cane it for along period of time.

What pad can you recommend would suit me?

Thanks

you can stick the EBC pads where the sun don't shine, production inconsistencies been reported too many times

Contact Alyn at AS Performance
Tell him how you use the car
And he will sell you the most suitable pad
(I swear by Pagid products and that what he sells me)

As far a blues go. For fast road use my experience a few years back was not too bad. But my mate also with a track car had real problems with them. And obviously riidaa has too.

So a suitable flavor of Pagid is my advice

Had a very poor experience with blue stuff on the road with my type r, firstly there is a the wooden pedal feel no modulation whatsoever, really poor from cold and finally with the lack of pedal feel I locked the brakes up on more than one occasion. Switched to Performance friction PF-08 pads and all the issues are gone and braking performance is even better

Join the club mate,EBC pads are utter Sh1te.I personally have been using performance friction pads for years now and highly rate them,a drivers pad:thumb:.SJ.

I've got blues on my blob, there okay but nothing to shout about.

Ebc stands for Everything Brakes Crap.

Echo what Banny said, and they were on AP 4 pots, very poor, pretty scary in a Type R with no ABS. :eek: