Spin from brake balance would be caused on corner entry, or mid-corner if you're trail braking and make a mistake. If you're spinning on corner exit you might be giving it too much power, or not enough power. Jumping off the gas in a corner is a good way to spin for sure.

 

No, what I meant is I was more likely to spin coming out of the corners, as I'm basically at a dead stop by the middle of the sharp corner, so I have to floor it to get back up to speed, while completing the turn. I'm definatly not spinning due to braking, I'm happy when I can turn when braking...

 

"Do you seriously think it would be better to go with different thickness pads on the back? I mean, that sorta locks you into a set bias, and I just want to dial it in so the front locks up slightly before the rear..."


Not "thickness". You're trying to change the relative coef of friction. Get some stock soft pads for the rear and something with more bite for the front.

Rob

 

That's what I've been picking up on, thanks for the clarification.. any experience with the EBC Greens? I was thinking of picking up a set for the front off of Gene's recommendation...

 

Ah, you're flooring it too soon, which is its own issue. Picture this... a string attached from the bottom of your steering wheel to the gas pedal, and another to the brake, with a little slack so that when the wheel is centered, you can floor either pedal. As you turn the wheel, it takes up the slack, and you can't push the pedal as much.

Basically a tire can only hold so much acceleration, in any direction. Yes, going around a turn is accelerating, you're accelerating towards the center of the turning circle. If you're using a tire to turn, you can't get full braking or acceleration out of it.

I highly recommend taking a high speed driver's ed course. The ones run by Mazda club of Washington are excellent, and full of friendly mazda drivers, as well as a good assortment of other cars. The one in March is full but they have another in June. The facility at VIR is absolutely beautiful, and most of the common places for off-track excursions are car and driver friendly with big fields to drive off into without bumping into anything.

www.mazdadrivers.com

Don't try it on those EBC Greens though, I know first-hand.

Though it might seem expensive at $300+, it's actually more economical than spending $20 at autox to get 5 minutes of seat time and stand around in the sun all day.

 

fronts locking up sucks too, i've mangles the suspension on my seven because of that but mainly cause the front tires were bald and caused the lockup. What tire sizes are you running? Wider rear tires really would help and not only with braking but all around. remember you can only brake as good as your tires grip so get some good brake pads and good tires (a little wider in the rear) and you should be set

 

I've never used the Green things. But Hawk has some good pads that work on the street. I use Porterfield's on my car. I don't quite understand why you have such a problem with rear lock up. The stock proportioning valve is biased pretty heavy to the front for safety reasons. Maybe you have a weight transfer problem. Or your front brakes aren't working properly.


Rob

 

Gene - I would LOVE to take a professional driver's class. I have already planned on doing it. I need to get out of school, first though. Thanks for the link, I'm definately keeping it on tab for after may (Grad), when I hopefully can find a job quickly

totallimmortal - Yeah, I'm not looking for a completely lockup of the front and none of the rear, just a small window to make my car feel less **** heavy when I brake.

Rob500 - Hawk would be my other choice. Maybe I am having a weight transfer problem. How do I tell if this is definatly the problem? Is it possible for the stock proportioning valve to die/mess up? It is an aftermarket (read: Generic) master cylinder that I got from Advance or Pep boys or something 3 years ago. I dunno. My problem for comparision is that I never seriously autocrossed any car other than my 7, and it's a $200 project car, so I've been fixing things as I go.. I'm not sure if it will be such a problem this season, as I get to start the season out with good tires, good suspension, and new wheel bearings. I had none of those until the last two races last year, and it rained for one of the two.

Maybe I won't need anything then, and I'll be lucky. What I'm thinking of doing is the first time out, doing one heat with the 7, and one with the Miata. I KNOW the Miata is set up properly with all its suspension upgrades, so it will give me something to compare against..

 

These are some of the more popular options out there...

Hawk
- HPS
- HP+
- Blue (be careful, full race pad)
- Black (be careful, full race pad)

EBC
- Green
- Red
(They have others, but they are recommended as full race pads).

Performance Friction used to have a bunch of stuff, but you might need to contact them for recent info.
They used to have their 90 and 93 compounds for RX-7 fitment, but they have discontinued a lot of them.

Even with that limited list, you can mix and match any axle pair to get a good brake bias front-to-rear.


-Ted

 

Thanks for the list, Ted.. I think I'm going to try the Hawk HP+ (based on the searches I've been doing)... Just for the fronts, that should give me slightly more grip, up there.. hopefuly it'll give me that little bit of instability that I'm looking for

 

Perhaps you misunderstood what I was saying. With the inherent understeer in the FCs, locking the front brakes makes it worse, loosing even more steering and the ability to make a turn when pushing the limits.

Ideally, neither front or rear should be in full lock.