[johnlear]

I thought it might be prudent to find / provide some independant opinion to support my argument above. The following text I found here:

Brake Shoe and Pad Fundamentals

Brake Shoe and Pad Fundamentals 28.4.1. Brake Shoe Self Energization The drum type brake consists of two internal semicircular shoes, which ...

theengineersjunction.blogspot.com

"Disc Brake Pad Alignment
..........The thickness of the pad provides a small offset between the pad/disc interface and the pad's back plate reaction abutment within the caliper (Fig. 28.12C). This produces a couple, which presses the pad harder against the disc at its leaning edge compared to the trailing edge. Consequently this effect causes a very small self-energizing servo action, due to which the wear rate at the leading edge is relatively higher than that at the trailing edge."

I think that pretty much concurs. I'm not suggesting the 'self servo' action is great enough with disc brakes to have a particularly significant direct affect on braking performance (though it must have some affect, possibly enough to feel at the pedal when new pads are fitted), but is strong enough to significantly affect the pattern of pad wear and so have knock on affects due to that...

Regards,
John.

 

[alfaitalia]

I think I just about have my head around that....will read it again.....be interesting to hear @EBC Brakes views on this.

But I guess that since when I push the middle pedal the car stops that's really all I need to fully understand!!

 

[johnlear]

I've corrected incorrect diagram numbering and references to diagram numbers in the text.

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

be interesting to hear @EBC Brakes views on this.

I think you will find that almost universally it will be said that a self energizing effect only exists with drum brakes. I don't think this is correct, but it isn't all that far from being so. I suspect that with disc brakes the effect is small enough that generally it is either ignored or not recognised to exist, because disc brakes are not significantly self energising, while drum brakes typically are very significantly self energising ...

Certainly drum brakes have a very strong self energizing effect in comparison (at least those with leading shoes, trailing shoes generate zero self energizing), while with disc brakes the effect is relatively quite feeble, not strong enough to make a significant difference to braking performance (why I suspect it would tend to be ignored), but strong enough to affect the manner in which the pads wear.

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

Trying to roughly quantify the self energising effect to vague ball park accuracy:

GTA calipers (as above, just an e.g.) use 38mm and 42mm diameter pistons.
Area of 38mm pistons = 1134 square millimetres.
Area of 42mm pistons = 1385 square millimetres.
The difference is 251 square millimetres.

So, the smaller piston has an area that is approximately 5% less than the larger piston, so the smaller piston will exert about 5% less hydraulic clamping force against the pad than will the larger piston.

If we make the assumption that the different sizes of piston were carefully selected to result in the sum pad force acting against the disc being as near equally distributed over the entire pad area as is reasonably possible, then we might also dare to assume that the self energizing effect may account for roughly 5% of the 'missing' pad force acting nearer the pad leading edge...

I think it needs to be kept in mind that the use of staggered piston sizes in multi piston calipers can, at best, only approximately equalise the distribution of sum force pressing the pad against the disc, and so can only lessen tapered wear, not eliminate it.

The self energizing effect may begin with new pads at X strength, but will lessen as the pads become significantly worn. Therefore it doesn't seem possible that the differences in piston size can fully compensate for the existence of the self energizing effect for the lifetime of the pads, even if they may transiently do so if the pads are transiently at a specific thickness.

If the different piston sizes could fully compensate for self energizing effect, then the pads would wear parallel with the backing plate (at least along the pad length, radial taper wear is a different issue). I've never seen a well worn pad that didn't resemble a wedge, though some worse than others..

It seems to me that the only thing which can plausibly account for pads not 'naturally' wearing parallel to the backing plate (negating the need for different sized pistons) is the existence of an additional force acting to unevenly load the pads, and a self energising force is the only candidate that I can see...

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

But I guess that since when I push the middle pedal the car stops that's really all I need to fully understand!!

Yes, the brakes may well slow the car quite well, but, is the pedal travel erratic and / or excessive? Is it spongy? If yes to any of these questions, then what are the factors that may be causing these problems? These things are resistant to correction unless the actual cause is diagnosed and addressed (and some of the causes are inherent in aspects of the stock caliper design). Just throwing new pads at it won't fix these problems, though the pedal may improve somewhat, for a while, until taper wear sets in again...

New or refurbished standard parts can be thrown at such problems with no real affect, done so often. But, the more that is understood of the why of how the brakes actually work, and why they may not work as well as we'd like, in the nitty gritty detail, the better we can make them, even if we have to deviate from standard specifications (standard specifications are not unlikely to be the root of the problem...).

I completely rebuilt my calipers both front and rear, new internals, new pads, new pins, new bushes, even new hoses. The calipers were as good as new yet still the brake pedal was erratically 'long' and spongy, it felt like intermittently there was air in the system, but there wasn't. The problem was the caliper pins, despite being new and operating in unworn pin bores (could still see the machining marks...).

But now, these problems have been largely eliminated due to modifications I've made, while still being fundamentally stock brakes. The pins have been modified to accept rubber O-rings which eliminate pin looseness, and other minor changes have been made. Pedal travel is now minimal, and sponginess hugely reduced. The pedal is 'right there', firm and responsive after about 2cm of travel. The brake action is WAY nicer than when in completely stock form, because the brakes are well maintained and have had an inherent design issue with the rear calipers corrected (I consider it a design 'fault', the standard slide pins are way too loose in their bores, which adds very substantially to erratically long and variable pedal travel).

I know that periodically sanding the pads to 're-parallel' the faces with the backing plates is very beneficial (i.e. correcting taper wear). I know that the front caliper bushes need to be periodically cleaned, and the pins de-rusted, polished and regreased. And now, from the thought I've recently been giving to the self energising effect, I think there is good reason, given the choice, to avoid pads with substantial chamfers in favour of pads that are 'full faced', because my analysis suggests that this will reduce taper wear.

It's the little details that add up to brakes with a consistently excellent pedal action, that are a pleasure to use. To make my brakes truly exceptional, I think all that remains to be done is to fit braided hoses, because the only significant remaining fault is that the pedal travel is too long only when braking VERY hard...

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

Trying to refine my analysis of this, just because I find it intrinsically interesting...

Resolving force vectors in the X and Y axes involves intimidating mathematics beyond my comfort zone, so to help I’ve used an online vector calculator found here:

Vector Calculator

Again, to provide a real world example (but other pads will be similar in principle) I’ve used the listed and diagrammatic dimensions of a new GTA brake pad (132mm long, 16mm thick). I don’t have a specimen GTA pad to measure so I’m not sure of the actual backing plate thickness, but 6.5mm seems common for relatively larger pads, so I’ve assumed the backing plate to be 6.5mm thick.

The corner / edge of the backing plate face closest to the disc (i.e. “inner edge”) is the ‘pivot’ point defining one end of the force vector, not the centre plane of the plate as I had previously assumed (incorrectly, not that it makes a substantive difference...).

With this particular pad the angle of the self energizing force vector is 5.2° tangential to the plane of the pad / disc faces (ascertained using CorelDraw). This is a product of the lateral offset of the backing plate from the disc, and the distance from the pad leading edge to the farthest end of the backing plate, where it abuts the caliper.

----------

It should be noted that while the self energising effect depends on the pistons to press the pads against the disc, the strength of the effect is not directly dependant on the magnitude of piston force, but rather is directly dependant on the magnitude of the friction / drag at the pad / disc interface. The piston force alone does not dictate the force created by pad friction / drag, which is as much a product of pad material, temperature and etc. It is quite possible to have a weak ‘drag’ at the pad / disc interface, despite a very high piston force, for instance if the pads are too cold or overheated...

The lateral component of the vector force is generated geometrically by the vector angle (5.2° in this example), so the magnitude of the self energized force is always proportional in ratio to the magnitude of the force generated by friction / drag at the pad / disc interface. This ratio doesn’t change unless the vector angle changes, which it does as the pads wear (the vector angle, and thus the self energizing effect, decreasing as the pad becomes thinner).

The force created by pad friction / drag can range from very slight with gentle brake applications, to substantially strong with heavy brake applications, but the ratio of the strength of friction / drag induced force relative to the strength of the self energising force does not alter with changes in pad friction / drag force.

----------

So, according to the above vector calculator:

If an arbitrary value of 100 ’units’ of magnitude is assigned to the force generated by pad friction / drag, then with a vector angle of 5.2° (as per new GTA pad) the portion of force generated by pad drag which acts purely in parallel with the pad / disc face (Y axis) is less than 100 ‘units’, becoming 99.58 ‘units’. The other 0.42 ‘units’ is redirected to act laterally, which tries to push the caliper farther away from disc face (due to the angle of the force vector).

And also according to the vector calculator, another 9.06 ‘units’ of force arises, acting laterally (X axis) to press the pad leading edge against the disc, this force being separate to piston force. This is additional force generated by the 5.2° vector angle, being the lateral pad force created by the self energizing effect...

This force is not directly proportional to the clamping force created by the pistons, rather it is directly proportional to the force created by pad friction / drag. For X force generated by pad friction / drag, the self generating force will always be Y, but the piston force (component) required to create a given level of pad friction / drag is variable depending on pad material, temperature, pad and disc face condition etc.

We can’t easily define what %age of the total lateral force is created by the pistons, and what %age is generated by the self energizing effect, because we do not know (well, I don’t...) the magnitude of the force created by pad friction / drag, which is hugely variable anyway. In other words, the amount of piston force required to generate a given magnitude of pad friction / drag is indeterminate, so there is no 'ratio' that can be used in calculations.

However it is posible to calculate the relative magnitude of the self energizing effect as a %age of the force created by pad friction / drag. When this ‘drag’ force is assigned an arbitrary value of 100 ‘units’, then in our example calculation gives a self energising force of 9.06 ‘units’ which is near enough to being 9% of the force strength generated by pad / disc friction /drag.

This could very easily be a quite substantial level of self generated force, given the potentially very large forces generated by pad friction...

------------

Lets compare the same pad when worn down to 3mm pad thickness:

The offset of the ‘inner edge’ of the backing plate to the disc face decreases from 9.5mm to 3mm. The chamfer disappears completely, and so the effective pad length increases from 105mm to about 132mm (length of backing plate, or just a bit less). This causes the angle of the force vector to decrease to 1.65° (compared to full thickness pad force vector being 5.2°).

Crunching these numbers in the calculator, with ‘drag’ force magnitude at the pad / disc interface as before being arbitrarily 100 ‘units’, but vector angle being 1.65°:

The portion of the ‘drag’ force which now acts in alignment with the pad / disc plane (Y axis) increases to 99.96 ‘units’ (new pad 99.58), and the lateral component (X axis) acting to push the caliper sideways becomes 0.04 ‘units’ (new pad 0.4).

More importantly, the additional lateral force generated by the self energizing effect acting at the pad leading edge (causing the pad to ‘self apply’ in some degree) decreases from 9.06 'units' to only 2.88 ‘units’, i.e. the lateral force generated by the self energizing effect decreases in strength from about 9% equivalance to the pad friction / drag force strength, to less than 3% equilvalence. So, when these pads wear down to 3mm thickness (about 1/3rd original thickness) the strength of the self energizing effect also reduces to about 1/3rd of what it was when the pads were new.

-----------

The force generated at the pad can be HUGE, so if the self energising effect is around 9% of that HUGENESS (give or take), then it can be a far from a trivial force, even if it is far less than the self energizing effect of a typical drum brake. From this, I would suggest that the very widely held belief that it is only drum brakes which generate a significant self energizing effect, and that disc brakes generate no self energising effect whatsoever, is very far from being true...

Again I’ll suggest that this could well be at least one reason why new pads can create a significantly stronger braking effect than well worn pads, i.e. because new pads have a significantly stronger self energising effect than well worn pads, due to geometric effects (i.e. strong enough to be noticeable). And, why pads wear with a longitudinal taper pattern, and not parallel.

I still think that it is probably better to have minimal self energising effect, to minimise taper wear and maximize pad area, and just maybe perhaps reduce possible ‘grabbiness’, even if this might only at most be a very minor issue for disc brakes (if it is at all...?)..

Regards,
John.

 

[Jetronic77]

I thought it might be prudent to find / provide some independant opinion to support my argument above. The following text I found here:

Brake Shoe and Pad Fundamentals

Brake Shoe and Pad Fundamentals 28.4.1. Brake Shoe Self Energization The drum type brake consists of two internal semicircular shoes, which ...

theengineersjunction.blogspot.com

"Disc Brake Pad Alignment
..........The thickness of the pad provides a small offset between the pad/disc interface and the pad's back plate reaction abutment within the caliper (Fig. 28.12C). This produces a couple, which presses the pad harder against the disc at its leaning edge compared to the trailing edge. Consequently this effect causes a very small self-energizing servo action, due to which the wear rate at the leading edge is relatively higher than that at the trailing edge."

I think that pretty much concurs. I'm not suggesting the 'self servo' action is great enough with disc brakes to have a particularly significant direct affect on braking performance (though it must have some affect, possibly enough to feel at the pedal when new pads are fitted), but is strong enough to significantly affect the pattern of pad wear and so have knock on affects due to that...

Regards,
John.

The Giulietta brembos (the revised ones) have offset pistons to reduce the uneven wear associated with this effect. Also, the pads are relatively thin compared to their length.

 

[johnlear]

The Giulietta brembos (the revised ones) have offset pistons to reduce the uneven wear associated with this effect.

"Offset"? Do you mean 'staggered', i.e. different piston diameters?

Using 'staggered' sized pistons will partially compensate for the self energizing effect and so in some degree decrease longitudinal taper wear. However, taper wear cannot be eliminated, only mitigated. Despite staggered pistons the self energizing effect will still exist in its' own right, unaffected by the relative piston sizes and so unchanged in strength. It's just that using staggered pistons causes the piston force to be unequally distributed on the pad, in an attempt to compensate for the self energizing effect (and so to whatever degree minimise taper wear).

This (use of staggered pistons to minimise taper wear) can only ever be partially effective because the self energizing effect is variable as the pads wear. It starts off being stronger when the pads are unworn, but gradually weakens as the pads become thinner, while the effect of piston stagger is always the same and never changes, i.e. the self energising effect and the piston stagger effect are only ever in balance at a particular pad thickness, which is transient.

So, hypothetically the difference in staggered piston sizes might be carefully selected to correctly compensate for the degree of self energising effect that exists with new thicker pads, but if so then as the pads wear thin the degree of compensation will become incorrect. Or, the staggered sizes might be selected to correctly compensate for the degree of self energizing effect that exists with somewhat worn pads, in which case it will be incorrect when the pads are new and unworn.

I did a bit of searching trying to discover Brembo piston sizes for Giulietta front calipers, all I could find were references to 40mm pistons...? Such as this page:

Repair Kit For Brembo Caliper Alfa Giulietta

Repair Kit For Brembo Caliper Alfa Giulietta

shop.alfisti.net

So it looks like these particular pistons fit a Brembo Giulietta caliper that uses four 'un-staggered' pistons, so have no compensation for self energizing effect. Is this a previous version, i.e. not a 'revised' Brembo caliper?

Also, the pads are relatively thin compared to their length.

According to my analysis, a pad that is thinner relative to its' length will generate a weaker self energising effect (compared to a pad that is shorter relative to length). Whether this would be a deliberate intent of making the pad longer I tend to doubt. More likely to be an accidental by-product of making the pad longer in order to maximise pad area...?

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

Not sure if I spelled this out above, but any self energizing force / auto-servo effect (pressing the pad against the disc, in addition to piston force) is force that does not need to be supplied by the pistons, and so can be deducted from the necessary piston force, and so can be deducted from the necessary pedal effort.

As a hypothetical e.g. if we were to assume that with zero self energizing effect (impossible in reality) an arbitrary 100 'units' of piston force was required to achieve 100 'units' of pad friction / drag (i.e. any given level of braking effect), then with a self energizing effect which creates a lateral force (acting on the pad in the X axis) that is equivalent in strength to 9 'units' of pad drag (acting in the Y axis), then the pistons would only need to supply 91 'units' of force for 100 'units' of pad 'drag' to be achieved. This would be felt as a lighter pedal effort needed to achieve a given braking affect, ie. the brakes will feel somewhat stronger.

Continuing the hypothetical, as the pads gradually wear thinner, say to about 1/3rd original thickness, the self energizing force will decrease to about 3 'units' and so in order for pad 'drag' force to reach 100 'units' the required piston force would need to increase to 97 'units' . The driver will need to use more effort at the brake pedal to achieve a given braking affect, but may not notice because the decrease in self energizing effect occurs gradually, but when new pads are fitted it becomes more obvious...

Of course these numbers are arbitrary and relative since true values are not known and some are variable, but serve to illustrate the principles and effects, I hope...

Regards,
John.

 

[Jetronic77]

"Offset"? Do you mean 'staggered', i.e. different piston diameters?

Using 'staggered' sized pistons will partially compensate for the self energizing effect and so in some degree decrease longitudinal taper wear. However, taper wear cannot be eliminated, only mitigated. Despite staggered pistons the self energizing effect will still exist in its' own right, unaffected by the relative piston sizes and so unchanged in strength. It's just that using staggered pistons causes the piston force to be unequally distributed on the pad, in an attempt to compensate for the self energizing effect (and so to whatever degree minimise taper wear).

This (use of staggered pistons to minimise taper wear) can only ever be partially effective because the self energizing effect is variable as the pads wear. It starts off being stronger when the pads are unworn, but gradually weakens as the pads become thinner, while the effect of piston stagger is always the same and never changes, i.e. the self energising effect and the piston stagger effect are only ever in balance at a particular pad thickness, which is transient.

So, hypothetically the difference in staggered piston sizes might be carefully selected to correctly compensate for the degree of self energising effect that exists with new thicker pads, but if so then as the pads wear thin the degree of compensation will become incorrect. Or, the staggered sizes might be selected to correctly compensate for the degree of self energizing effect that exists with somewhat worn pads, in which case it will be incorrect when the pads are new and unworn.

I did a bit of searching trying to discover Brembo piston sizes for Giulietta front calipers, all I could find were references to 40mm pistons...? Such as this page:

Repair Kit For Brembo Caliper Alfa Giulietta

Repair Kit For Brembo Caliper Alfa Giulietta

shop.alfisti.net

So it looks like these particular pistons fit a Brembo Giulietta caliper that uses four 'un-staggered' pistons, so have no compensation for self energizing effect. Is this a previous version, i.e. not a 'revised' Brembo caliper?



According to my analysis, a pad that is thinner relative to its' length will generate a weaker self energising effect (compared to a pad that is shorter relative to length). Whether this would be a deliberate intent of making the pad longer I tend to doubt. More likely to be an accidental by-product of making the pad longer in order to maximise pad area...?

Regards,
John.

No offset as in closer to the trailing edge instead of centered. But the same size. 38mm all around.

In any case wear is close enough to even that I don't notice tapered wear. That's as good as it's going to get anyway.

 

[johnlear]

No offset as in closer to the trailing edge instead of centered. But the same size. 38mm all around.
In any case wear is close enough to even that I don't notice tapered wear. That's as good as it's going to get anyway.

Interesting, thank you. That would be another strategy which should achieve a similar result (less uneven pad wear), one I've not come across nor has occurred to me. It should work more or less as well as staggered piston sizes, at least in theory, depending on how much offset is possible.

Another strategy might be to reduce the area of pad material beneath the trailing piston relative to area of material beneath the leading piston. Unequal radial distribution of pad material area is a common strategy used to (presumably) lessen radial taper wear (i.e. greater pad wear nearer the outer edge of the pad than nearer the inner edge). This is probably why many pads have leading and trailing edges which are angled so they point more or less toward the disc centre, thus deceasing pad area nearer the inner edge of the pad face.

In any case wear is close enough to even that I don't notice tapered wear. That's as good as it's going to get anyway.

So that 'offset strategy' seems to be working to at least reduce taper wear, which is worthwhile, however it might be achieved.

It's been my experience that it takes very little taper wear to have a significant affect, at least on pedal travel, so anything which lessens it is a good thing. Quite recently I measured the thickness of all four of my front pads and found longitudinal AND radial taper wear of 0.25mm on all of them (give or take 0.05mm). This was corrected by sanding the pads on a surface plate (wet / dry paper glued to it, beware the dust..) until the faces were parallel with the backing plates. This resulted in a quite noticable reduction in pedal free play.

I've done this before, but not when the taper wear was so seemingly minor. I knew there would be a theoretical effect to reduce pedal travel, but wasn't expecting it to be at all significant with only a 0.25mm taper having been corrected, and was surprised how much reduction in pedal free play actually resulted...

Regards,
John.

 

[alfaitalia]

I've never had pads on any bike or car I've owned that have worn anything other than perfectly flat without an outside influence affecting the wear....ie seized or partially seized pistons, poorly lubed locating pins or other sliding points etc. I bet if I whipped out the EBC yellow stuff pass that have been in my 159 front calipers for the last couple of years you would find flat pads......the old ones (still in the shelf in my garage as they were less than half worn are perfectly flat......at least they are to my eye...I might mike them up tomorrow out of curiously. As interesting as this thread is I feel that, and although I quite believe the theory that your are saying, I don't believe that this affects pad wear do any measurable degree on road going cars.....and if you are getting tapered wear on your pads I would be looking for a maintenance or fitment issue before I blamed the self energizing effect of the pads geometry. Possibly you are looking at a theory to solve an issue that simply does not exist in the brakes of most cars.

 

[johnlear]

I've seen it very commonly, it may not be obvious unless you are looking to see it. I've seen particularly bad cases when the caliper has had an obvious issue like a stuck slide pin, but also to a lesser degree when the caliper was in good order.

Here's what EBC Brakes has to say:
"Unfortunately, you will always see some degree of pad tapering. It is common to see a few millimetres of taper, and this is totally normal. Furthermore, in track-based driving situations, you may see slightly more tapered wear. Pad tapering is completely inescapable, but there are things that can be done to limit it."

Note my underlining.

And same page
"Unfortunately, it is near impossible to completely eradicate taper wear completely."

I think this pretty much concurs with my observations.

EBC Brakes Racing – Brake Pad Tapered Wear and How to Avoid or Correct It

This article explores the phenomenon of pad tapering and what causes this on a multi-piston brake caliper

ebcbrakes.com

And I also just found the following on another site:
"This unequal force distribution it's caused by the moment created between pad drag force and abutment force [1]. As can you see in the left picture the maximum force at the leading edge it's about one-third greater then the average pressure, in the opposite side, at the trailing end the pressure has approximately two-thirds of the average pad pressure [1]. This kind of wear, will force the brake pads to move greater distances when the brakes are actuated, these things will determine a longer pedal travel. [2] This negative phenomenon in combination with other negative phenomena during the severe braking can lead to a degraded braking effectiveness, actually for an identical pedal effort the vehicle deceleration it will be smaller. In the same time the thermal effects will not be the same on the entire brake pad, at the leading end the temperature it will be higher due to greater pressure and the pyrolytic effect will be created earlier in this zone, resulting in an uneven braking coefficient on the brake pad surface."

I think this also largely concurs with my thoughts re the self energizing effect, though I think my analysis is somewhat more rigorous (if I say so myself...). Note that I've underlined the sentences referring to increased pedal travel and altered pedal effort. Worth going to the page to see the accompanying diagrams.

Longitudinal tapered brake pad wear

Braking it's a very complex action due to various phenomena and processes which occurs during the braking process. The brake system must be a reliable and a high performance system, in the last period we expect to not record any malfunctions or misbehaves.

www.linkedin.com

Regards,
John.

 

[johnlear]

Just some housekeeping on this. I realised I'd made an error using the vector calculator, which I've corrected. On the plus side this error made only a relatively small difference to the calculated value of the self energizing effect. Previously I incorrectly calculated this to be 9.06 'units' of 'self energizing' force, but it is more like 8.4 'units', so 0.66 'units' of difference.

I've included this correction in the folowing diagram:

So assuming no more hidden errors on my part, in this particular example, independant of piston force, the self energizing effect presses the pad against the disc with a lateral force that is equivalent to being (give or take) 8.4% the strength of the force generated by pad 'drag', whatever the magnitude of this force may happen to be at any given moment (i.e. if it rises so too does the self energizing force, if it falls so does the self energizing force, being always X% of the pad 'drag' force).

How strong is the pad 'drag' force? Of course it will vary wildly depending on level of braking affect, so it must range between being quite modest to being very substantial. So, a force that is around 8 or 9 percent of the pad 'drag' generated force acting within the caliper is likely to often be significantly significant...

Regards,
John.