big or small brakes?

[phil_cardiff]

What rear disc size does my mk2 1998 1.8is have? 251mm or 276mm? Who'd have thought ordering brake pads would be this complicated?

[MX-5 Lazza]

251mm. The 271mm discs are fitted to Mk2.5 Sport (and a few Mk2.5 specials) only.

[phil_cardiff]

Cheers for this. £50 for rear brake pads?! Bloody hell, wasn't expecting that!

[MX-5 Lazza]

Yeah, rears are more expensive that fronts for some weird reason.

[Munter]

MX-5 Lazza said:

Yeah, rears are more expensive that fronts for some weird reason.

Fronts shared with the 323, but 323 had drum rears on most versions? Thus less demand for rears... Possibly.

[phil_cardiff]

Is it worth the extra £25 or so to get the genuine Mazda pads rather than the EBC Kevlar pads?

[Legend83]

phil_cardiff said:

Is it worth the extra £25 or so to get the genuine Mazda pads rather than the EBC Kevlar pads?

Yes. I got Kevlars with a special deal from MX5 Parts (Discs and pads all in for £80). They are not great and I will be getting rid ASAP.

[OnlyMX5ives]

Kevlars are known to be rubbish.

Std pads are actually very good but there are loads of options.

Remember MX5 parts is NOT the only supplier

(and on certain products they are quite expensive)

[MX-5 Lazza]

It's worth getting Mazda pads over anything branded EBC.

[freerange7]

Bit unfair I think to say this about EBC.

Bedding them in properly and using the correct colour helps.

They produce less dust and work well when matched to there grooved discs.

If in doubt, buy the main dealer pads.

[MX-5 Lazza]

Kevlar & Greenstuff aren't as good as Mazda pads and Yellowstuff are better on track but worse on road. Greenstuff are too unpredictable. You might get a good set or you might get ste. Just do a search on various forums (Nutz is good) for EBC and see what others opinions are.

ETA: I used to have EBC Turbo-Groove discs and Greenstuff pads on my old Mk1 but I wasted my money. Stock discs and pads were just as good if not better, a hell of a lot cheaper and don't make annoying noise like the EBC discs do. They look good but that's about it.

Edited by MX-5 Lazza on Tuesday 13th January 22:34

[phil_cardiff]

As my 5 is used for spirited road use at best I went with the Mazda pads.