Watch Brake Disc Disintegrate Under Extreme Heat
Have You Ever Witnessed a Brake Disc Explode? It’s Awesome!
Brakes use friction to work. Hopefully that’s not a new flash to any of you. Friction generates heat. While brakes are designed to handle a certain amount of heat, there is such a thing as too much heat. When that happens, bad things occur. In extreme cases, the disc goes boom!
Brakes have different ways of handling heat. When brakes get hot, they become ineffective. It’s why there are runoffs on the sides of highways for semis that careen out of control: because they were riding their brakes and generated too much heat.
Now take all of that heat and push it to the extreme, while dropping in a bit of science. That’s what you have in the video below from the folks at Beyond the Press. Heat, friction, thermal imaging, and a giant explosion are what you’re about to witness, in all their destructive glory!
As a frequent listener to the Best of Car Talk podcast, one of the many problems often diagnosed is a stuck brake caliper. It’s always stressed that it’s a problem which needs to be taken care of immediately. This, my friends, is why. It’s what can happen if too much friction is applied to the discs.
Fiery Armageddon is cool, unless it happens on your own car while you’re cruising down the highway at 80 miles-per-hour. Then it’s not as cool.
What do you think? Have you ever had a brake caliper catastrophically fail on you or someone you know before? Let us know!
Chime in with your thoughts on the forum. >>
Via [Beyond the Press]
