'13 Civic Si BBK advice

I run the ATE Type 200. Its the same as the old "superblue." The nice thing with superblue and the amber type200 is that when you were swapping/flushing fluid you just went until you saw the color change. But superblue is no longer available.

In any case, the Type200 is plenty unless you are hitting extremely demanding track days. The motul/rbf fluids are great but they also absorb moisture from the air more readily than the ATE fluid. This means you have to flush your system more often. The ATE stuff can be left in the system much longer without losing its ability to handle heat and provide good pedal feel. The "track day" stuff has a higher boiling point but is also meant to be flushed out much much more often. So balance your fluid with your driving and your ability/willingness to do maintenance.

Track stuff for track cars. You don't want to run track pads on the street as you won't generate enough heat for them to be useful. No sense in rear ending someone cause your brakes were too cold.

Same with street/performance pads. They won't hold up to track day temps.

Track fluid for track car/track days. Street fluid for a street car. Match your pads/rotors/fluid to what you are doing.


I will say the ATE 200 has held up very well for me. I used it in a set of brakes that I melted the piston into the backing plate. Some of the mountain roads in the smokies are very very demanding on brakes. I have had no issues with that fluid. It should work extremely well for you.


Don't mix the fluids. In my experience one "can" of the ATE fluid will be more than enough to fill your reservoir and flush the entire system.
 
Good to know! I know there is a trade off between maintenance and performance due to the increasing hydroscopic properties of higher quality brake fluids, I just don't know how much of a trade off happens at this level. The ATE listing says it can last up to 3 years under normal highway conditions - I'm guessing the Motul fluid wont last quite as long as I've seen recommended change intervals of once a year max for that fluid. I guess I'm curious how much better performing the better fluids are than the longer lasting fluids. If I'm going for highest boiling point in a track fluid, I might as well go for the RBF 660 (or Torque RT700 based on that list I linked), but in reality she wont see more track time til next season so this change I'll stick with the ATE they give me for free.

Unfortunately I daily and track my car, so for this season I am looking for the best of both worlds even though I know that is somewhat of an impossibility. Next season I will be dedicating track pads and fluid for track days and swapping out before/after.

I remember seeing those gnarly melted backing plates in your thread Nix, if the fluid held up under those conditions I'd say it's more than good enough for the moderate duty it will see in my setup until next spring. Thanks!
 
Here's an interesting question: What kind of brake fluid do they run with carbon-ceramic setups? Those get so hot the rotors glow and pads catch fire sometimes, they must be using some serious fluid to keep stopping after such tremendous heat cycles. Saw a Ferrari outside my work last week with carbon-ceramics and was admiring them :love1:
 
I know jrotax101 has mentioned he uses Motul RBF 600 on the track, and he has a lot of track time (and instructs). He's mentioned to others that he suggests Motul RBF (600 or 660) for tracking their cars. He just said make sure you swap it out often.
 
I know jrotax101 has mentioned he uses Motul RBF 600 on the track, and he has a lot of track time (and instructs). He's mentioned to others that he suggests Motul RBF (600 or 660) for tracking their cars. He just said make sure you swap it out often.

I run the same in my setup that I track often -- RBF600. Very reliable and easily accessible for me locally as well.
 
You could always get speed bleeders for your new calipers. Makes bleeding super easy and then you could cycle the fluid as needed. Usually the bleeding part is a PITA for one person.
 
You could always get speed bleeders for your new calipers. Makes bleeding super easy and then you could cycle the fluid as needed. Usually the bleeding part is a PITA for one person.
That's the plan. I have a few other major tools I plan to buy around the same time so I can start doing a lot of the basic maintenance myself. The nice thing about the speed bleeder is that it does double duty for bleeding the clutch. It's a must since I live alone and none of my car friends live nearby anymore.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
Totally stoked. All 4 corners are 2 piece rotors; rears are fixed, fronts are floating. And the hats are anodized grey hence the not-usual-black color.
 
The picture he sent me does not do it justice, lol. Kit just arrived, will be uploading pics as I go. Install scheduled for tomorrow morning.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
Kit is installed, but I was at the Indians game so I have not had time to bed in the pads yet. Will be doing that tomorrow morning. Also, I tried to upload pictures earlier with my previous post and I'm not seeing the attachments. So I will be uploading all my pics at once, likely tomorrow when I make it home.

Initial notes after driving it home: Holy hell, I almost died the first time I put my foot on the brake pedal. The feel is entirely different and when I was used to the short travel to get to stopping power, the extremely long travel now is disconcerting at first. I know the stopping power is there but I wonder how far I have to push the deal to reach it. My only concern going into this install was that I had not calculated the increase in surface area that the brake master cylinder would have to contend with with the new calipers. It still seems like I hit enough, if not peak, brake power before I get to the end of the pedal travel, but damn does it seem close.

I did have to call the manufacturer to ask a few questions, mostly because the instructions were very vague and because I was missing 4 retainer bolts for the front caliper brackets. But overall everything fits perfectly and feel great. I will be posting photos and my bed in feelings tomorrow or Thursday.

Thanks for your patience, it's totally worth it.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
Bleed em' really well. If the pedal feel is still terrible, an upgrade to stainless lines can help but I usually don't recommend them for a street driven car as they have a limited life expectancy compared to the normal rubber lines.

If after all that the pedal feel is still very long and doesn't reach peak clamping force - aka the ABS kicks on - then the piston(s) is/are too large a volume of fluid for the stock master cylinder to move. At that point you may have to look into fitting an MC from a car that comes with larger brakes stock. On the 8th gen cars with upgraded brakes the Acura TL-S MC was a popular swap. That car came with large Brembo calipers and could move a lot more fluid. It "should" have the right kind of connections for the brake booster but hard lines may need to be moved, bent, replaced.
 
Thanks so much @Nix. This was really the only worry I had about my kit: the master cylinder not being able to handle the fluid capacity upgrade. You will see why when I upload the pics, lol. I wasn't sure what I would do about it if that was the case, other than look for a larger master cylinder to upgrade to. So that helps a lot. There is definitely still significant stopping power available with the stock master cylinder as I slammed on them a couple times from ~25mph just to make sure they worked as soon as I pulled out, but when I bed them in tomorrow I think I will get a better feel for how much I really have, and how much will be added after the proper bed-in process.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
  • Like
Reactions: Nix
Oh, and I forgot to mention that SS lines came with the kit and were installed along with everything else today. The stiffness when we were bleeding the lines felt great, and I was surprised there was so much more travel in it when I actually drove it. I would be happy if it felt like when I was bleeding it all the time, which was really incredibly stiff with the initial bite right at the top of the pedal travel. But we shall see how things are after I get used to the new pedal feel.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
to maybe revive this thread i might have some insite... i'm doing TL type-s Brembo Calipers on my SI. i have a 2014 si and i bought calipers off ebay for 130 total. There is a company called RSXretrofit.com they rethread the calipers and give you new bolts which is going to be a direct bolt on for our 9th gens. All you need is front brakes off a tl type s and rotors. i'm going this route. the rethread and milling to fit our cars is 350. There is no modification we need to do to our suspension for this.
 
Rear Calipers are 4 piston, and have a separate part that actuates the e-brake that I realize now I didn't take a picture of and wish I had. It's a strange setup that runs the brake line through the e-brake to the caliper thus making the e-brake a hydraulic system instead of a mechanical system. I am still getting used to how that feels, especially when I pull in somewhere and set the brake with my foot still on the brake pedal because it causes the brake pedal to push back at you.


2016-09-22 09.09.39.jpg
2016-09-22 09.09.09.jpg

2016-09-22 09.08.10.jpg
2016-09-22 09.07.45.jpg
 
Rear rotors are 2-piece bolted, and actually look like a proper rotor with the vanes and everything. They are 300mm x 28mm IIRC. Not that they do as much work, but these definitely get a lot hotter than the stock setup, even in the back. The hats are anodized gray. Couldn't decide on a color and didn't want black since that's standard.2016-09-22 09.06.39.jpg

2016-09-22 09.07.09.jpg
 
Back
Top