Content > Masa's Audi A3

We all know that braking generates tons of heat – just a glimpse of a brake rotor glowing red should be enough to make this point rather clear. Obviously the heat isn’t limited to the rotor only – anything nearby will get an equal share of the heat. TakSpeed has dediced than they can do something about this, and as I haven’t seen hardly any reviews of their Titanium Brake Shims, I just had to give them a try myself.

The shims are obviously meant to protect the calipers from excess heat. In doing this, the two main benefits would be;
- Preventing brake fluid overheating
- Lowering temperatures inside the caliper

The first point should be quite obvious to anyone who has tracked even slightly seriously. Remember how good the brake pedal feels when you have just had your fluids changed? And then, remember how the pedal starts getting more and more mushy even just after one trackday? This is exactly what the shims should prevent. By keeping the temperatures lower, the fluids should also last longer.

The second point may not be quite as obvious, but definitely not any less important. Many modern fixed calipers are built from aluminum, and while highly heat resistant, they won’t tolerate endless abuse either. The piston coatings and dust seals are the ones that are most likely to give up first. Caliper rebuilding can get rather expensive, so that’s more motivation for trying to protect them.

So do the shims really work? Couldn’t honestly say quite yet. I’ve only had them on for one trackday yet. So far I can say this – there was at least no decrease of braking performance and feel, which is a good start Let’s give them a bit more usage first, and I’ll get back to this topic later.