Do Mountain Bike Brake Pads Actually Fade? What Our Testing Found

Gorilla Brakes and HINE-R brake-pad testing · September 2026

Brake fade gets blamed for a lot of things.

You’re halfway down a long descent. The brake starts feeling different. Lever travel changes, braking feels less predictable and suddenly you’re pulling harder than you were at the top.

The natural reaction is: “My brake pads are fading.” We’ve probably all said it.

But after putting a range of compounds through controlled heat testing, we’ve started looking at brake fade differently. Under the conditions we tested, genuine friction-material fade was surprisingly difficult to reach. In our final destructive run, other parts of the brake system failed while the pads were still doing their job.

That distinction matters. It also needs some context: this was a first round of dry laboratory testing, with limitations we’ll explain below.

Why we wanted to test this

Brake-pad marketing usually talks about power, heat resistance and fade resistance. What’s harder to find is accessible data showing what happens to the complete brake system as temperatures rise.

We worked with Adam Read, to record three things together: braking power, rotor temperature and caliper temperature. Lee Hine of Gorilla Brakes supplied the materials and attended the testing; Adam Read - built the rig and wrote the engineering report.

The aim was to gather useful information, not manufacture a winner. A rider braking occasionally at junctions and a rider descending in the Alps need different things from their pads. Peak power alone won’t tell either rider the whole story.

Read the full brake pad laboratory report.

How we tested the pads

The fixed weight matters because every compound receives the same lever force. We’re comparing the response to a known input, rather than asking someone to pull the lever with roughly the same effort each time.

Braking power was calculated from the increase in the lathe’s electrical power consumption above its unloaded reading. The watts shown are a comparison within this rig and protocol, not a direct measurement of stopping distance on a bike.

After bedding and cooling, the original procedure used three seconds of braking followed by seven seconds off, up to 200°C rotor temperature. It then changed to seven seconds on and three seconds off until the caliper reached the stopping limit. That change in timing is one of the aspects we’re improving.

What does brake fade actually mean?

For this article, it helps to separate two different problems.

Pad fade is a substantial loss of friction performance because the friction material has become too hot.

System fade is a change in braking performance because heat affects another part of the brake. That might involve caliper heat soak, hydraulic-fluid heating, seals, pistons, the hose or the rotor.

A change in lever feel doesn’t automatically prove the fluid has boiled. This test did not establish fluid boiling as the cause of every change in braking behaviour.

What the braking-power graphs showed

Many of the compounds remained strong beyond 300–400°C rotor temperature. Some generated considerably more braking power hot than they did at the start of the test.

That challenges the assumption that rising temperature must always mean falling power. A compound’s operating window, how it beds in and how it recovers all matter.

These graphs show trends, not laboratory precision to the nearest watt. The engineering report notes that some points were omitted to smooth the plots, and the overview and individual curves should not be treated as identical raw-data traces. The approximate figures below are read from the individual graphs.

The Gorilla Enduro Pro range

Our own compounds showed three different responses. Maximum output was only part of the story; how that output changed with temperature was just as useful.

Enduro Pro Ultimate

The Enduro Pro Ultimate range for Shimano started at approximately 700 W in the low-temperature region, reached around 1,000 W near 80–100°C and continued building as temperatures rose. In this test it reached around 1,350 W close to 390°C.

There was a reduction towards the extreme end of the normal run, but output remained much higher than at the start. We’ll return to this compound in the destructive test section.

Enduro Pro Semi-Metallic

Enduro Pro Semi-Metallic gave approximately 920 W from cold and around 1,170 W near 180–190°C. It settled through the middle temperature range, then climbed again, reaching approximately 1,300 W near the upper end of the test.

Enduro Pro Resin

Enduro Pro Resin produced lower absolute output in this setup. Power increased as the rotor warmed, fell through the middle of the range and recovered later, approaching approximately 1,000 W in the high-300°C region.

These are results from one brake, rotor and test protocol. They aren’t a universal ranking for every bike, rider or condition.

So what is actually fading?

While the pads were producing braking power, we were also watching caliper temperature. This is where the test became particularly interesting.

A hot rotor doesn’t tell you, on its own, how much heat the hydraulic system is experiencing. Some compounds allowed the rotor to get much hotter before the caliper approached its stopping limit. Others brought the caliper up to that limit sooner.

That is consistent with different heat transfer through the pads, but it isn’t a direct measurement of thermal conductivity. Braking power, heating rate, elapsed time and the application schedule can also influence these curves.

The sintered pad behaved differently

The engineering report found that the sintered pads reached approximately 120°C caliper temperature at nearly half the rotor temperature reached by some semi-metallic and ceramic compounds before the same limit. The sintered run therefore ended much sooner.

The friction material wasn’t necessarily failing. The interesting part was how quickly the caliper heated up. Heat reaching the caliper matters because the pistons, seals, fluid and hose have operating limits of their own.

There is an important caveat: the sintered pads were still not fully bedded in, even after extra bedding and the main test. The report says this significantly affected the results. We need to repeat the comparison with the revised protocol before treating it as a firm conclusion.

The trend is strong enough to investigate further. It does not prove that every sintered pad behaves the same way, or that sintered pads are the only compounds that can contribute to brake fade.

The pad hasn’t necessarily faded. The brake has.

Pad fade means the friction material is losing performance. System fade means another part of the brake is changing behaviour because of heat. From the rider’s perspective both can feel like weaker braking, but understanding the cause changes what we need to investigate.

We carried on until the brake actually failed

At the end of the day, we fitted Enduro Pro Ultimate pads and deliberately continued beyond the normal caliper-temperature limit until something failed. This was a destructive laboratory test, not a simulation of a typical ride.

At approximately 450°C rotor temperature, the Shimano RT86 buckled badly enough to become unusable. We replaced it with a 203 mm TRP R1 rotor and carried on.

The TRP rotor reached approximately 650°C and began glowing orange. The PTFE liner in the hose appears to have melted at the caliper end, causing hydraulic pressure loss. Continued heat soak then damaged the caliper seals and stuck the pistons in the caliper body.

The report records no observed friction-material fade even at that temperature. After cooling, the pads had some edge crumbling and small cracks across the surface, but the main bulk of the friction material remained intact and was judged still functional.

We had buckled one rotor, heated another until it glowed orange, damaged the brake hose and damaged the caliper seals while the friction material was still doing its job.

That does not establish a safe 650°C operating rating for the pads or any part of the brake. The complete system had failed. What it shows is that, in this particular extreme test, system components reached their limits before we observed pad fade.

Does this mean sintered pads are bad?

No. This first round of testing isn’t a reason to dismiss a whole compound family.

Sintered pads can be a sensible option where durability in harsh, abrasive conditions is a priority. The question raised here is a possible trade-off: a compound with substantial metal content may pass heat into the caliper sooner, even while its friction material continues to work.

We did not measure pad life or wet braking in this round, so we cannot use these results to quantify a durability advantage or declare a wet-weather winner. Compound choice still depends on the rider’s conditions and the complete brake setup.

Cold performance might matter more than we think

Surviving a 500–600°C rotor sounds impressive. But for many UK riders, useful braking on the first pull of a cold brake may matter more often.

Think of a wet January ride in northern England, with long stretches between brake applications. That is a different question from what happens when a laboratory rotor glows orange.

The report suggests that reaching a useful operating temperature may be as relevant as dissipating extreme heat, depending on terrain, weather and riding style. Some compounds in this dry test were stronger from cold; others became substantially stronger once hot. We still need wet testing to understand how those differences translate to winter trails.

We’ve purchased equipment to log actual brake temperatures during wet and muddy UK riding. That should help us compare the laboratory temperature ranges with the conditions riders regularly experience.

A dip in braking power doesn’t always mean fade

Several pads showed a temporary reduction in power around approximately 250°C, followed by recovery closer to 350°C.

One likely explanation is green fade: incomplete curing of resin during bedding, with gases released as the pad gets hotter. The engineering team believes the original bedding process may not have completed that curing.

That is a working explanation, not a proven diagnosis for every dip. Recovery while temperature continues rising is a reason to investigate bedding before automatically labelling the curve the friction material’s final thermal limit.

Bedding in matters more than we expected

The original bedding procedure heated the rotor to 150°C, allowed the system to cool, then heated it to 225°C and cooled it again. Before each stage, the caliper was below 35°C and the rotor below 30°C.

For the next laboratory round, the plan is to raise the second stage to approximately 250°C and add a third stage reaching approximately 350°C. We’ll then repeat each compound’s main test twice.

The purpose is to reduce incomplete bedding as a variable before comparing the compounds. These are proposed laboratory temperatures, not a replacement for the bedding instructions supplied with a rider’s brake system.

One important limitation with the sintered results

The sintered pads’ incomplete bedding remains a significant limitation, even though they received extra bedding. Their power and caliper-temperature results need repeating. Until then, the faster caliper heating is an observed trend worth investigating, rather than settled proof about sintered compounds.

What about aluminium backing plates and cooling fins?

The engineering report concluded that backing-plate material or design did not make a sufficiently noticeable difference to braking power, rotor temperature or caliper temperature under these test conditions.

Some individual curves look different, but that does not justify claiming that aluminium conclusively sent more heat into the caliper, or that fins conclusively improved cooling. The report also notes that results might differ with airflow. This test cannot settle their performance on a moving bike.

Why wasn’t there airflow?

We initially intended to use a fan to represent riding airflow. With it running, the rig could not build enough heat to investigate the extreme-temperature region, so the main tests ran with the fan off. The fan was used between tests to cool the system.

That makes this a controlled thermal stress test, with reduced direct equivalence to riding. Airflow on a bike can change the cooling of the rotor, pads and caliper.

There were other limitations too. The lathe’s power display appeared to average readings over roughly three seconds, so some early brake applications lasted closer to 3.5–4 seconds. Switching the application schedule at 200°C introduced further variation. Both can affect how quickly heat builds and so influence rotor-versus-caliper comparisons.

These were single main runs per compound, with no quantitative pad-wear measurements. Some data points were omitted to smooth the plotted curves. Taken together, those limitations mean we should treat this first round as useful evidence of trends, with more controlled repeat testing still needed.

So can a mountain bike rider actually make their brake pads fade?

Yes. Friction materials have thermal limits, and this test does not show that brake pads cannot fade.

What it suggests is more specific: making a modern high-performance brake pad genuinely fade appears to be extremely difficult under the conditions we tested. In the destructive Ultimate run, other parts of the brake reached their limits first.

We cannot turn that into a promise about every compound, every descent or every brake. The rotor, caliper, hose, fluid, bedding and cooling conditions are all part of the result.

What our testing has changed

We’re now looking beyond peak power or the highest temperature a pad can survive. Cold and hot braking power, friction stability, caliper heat transfer, rotor temperature and recovery all deserve attention.

Wear, wet behaviour, noise and vibration, modulation and bedding behaviour also matter. This first test did not measure all of them; they are part of the wider programme we want to build.

And we’re not finished testing

The next round is planned around a HINE-R Wilfred caliper, TRP Trail Evo lever, HINE-R hose and a 2.3 mm TRP R1 rotor, with two identical brake setups available.

Our priorities are:

• Hotter laboratory bedding and two main runs for each compound.
• A revised brake-application protocol with a more consistent transition at 200°C.
• Weighing pads when new, after bedding and after testing, using scales with 0.01 g resolution.
• Comparing rotor designs and thicknesses.
• Developing a repeatable wet test, once we can apply water consistently.
• Logging real brake temperatures during wet and muddy UK trail riding.

If there’s one thing we’d take from this first major round of testing, it’s this:

The pad hasn’t necessarily faded. The brake has.

Understanding where heat travels through the complete brake system may ultimately be as important as measuring maximum friction temperature. That’s why Gorilla Brakes and HINE-R Engineering are continuing the testing programme.

For the compounds discussed here, see our Enduro Pro range.