410 Brake Upgrade

[Roger Morrall]

Some further thoughts:

I fear I cannot definitively confirm the pads I was using as my records stayed with the car but they were as fitted by both BCS and SLJ.

My issue was always with very long descents coupled with the lack of engine braking. Garmin reported that we had risen and fallen more than 26 miles on the Alpine trip, Le Havre to Le Havre.

I don’t believe that my car differed from the norm - I could only get engine braking in 1st and it would only actually drop into first at about 6 mph, which tended to hold up the traffic.

I always found the brakes brilliant in every other circumstance. They were heavy compared to modern practise but in that pre ABS era designers had to balance out the risk of lock up and resultant lack of control and the only way they could achieve that was to make sure you had to push down very hard before the brakes would lock. A design balance that was taken to extremes in the Morris Minor which will actually stop on a sixpence without locking its brakes provided sheer panic provides sufficient impetus to your right foot!

Here’s a picture I took from the top of the Stelvio for you. I forced the poor old lady up but found a rather gentler way down!