Brake Rotor Splash Guards?

[MrTwo]

While prepping for a rotor / pad swap on my NSX I found this site with evidence that removing the front splash guards is good for 100F+ lower brake temps due to additional airflow. Searching Prime seems to show everything from "it's a great track mod" to "it will cook your suspension and ruin your NSX" :tongue: Since all the info was from several years ago I'd like to hear everyone's current opinions on the matter. Has anyone had any problems tracking their car with no splash guards?

My car is a 91 with HP+ pads, SS lines, Dali air deflectors, ATE fluid and is a weekend toy that sees a couple HPDE events per year.

Options:

1) Honda knows best, don't mess with it.
2) Take them off and keep everything nice and cool.
3) Cut holes in the splash guard to increase airflow.

 

[92 white 0650]

Re: IIRC

which is nothing to take for granted, as it's been 9 years, but I'm pretty sure me and all my central CA track rat buds took ours off. And my race car doesnt' have them even though I race in the rain, so ditch em and don't think twice because..............

if you have 2nd thoughts, there will be 3, then a 4th and next thing ya now, you'll be thinking forever. :wink:

Oh wait, you wanted current opinions..............never mind.

 

[MrTwo]

Re: IIRC

which is nothing to take for granted, as it's been 9 years, but I'm pretty sure me and all my central CA track rat buds took ours off. And my race car doesnt' have them even though I race in the rain, so ditch em and don't think twice because..............

if you have 2nd thoughts, there will be 3, then a 4th and next thing ya now, you'll be thinking forever. :wink:

Oh wait, you wanted current opinions..............never mind.

Thanks, 6 years on Prime must have turned me into a mod curmudgeon :biggrin: Splash guards will be coming off during the brake maintenance.

 

[ac011]

I will not remove the rear splash guards, the heat from the rotos may damage your ball joints. However, the front should be safe to remove. On the safe side, I did installed a small piece of aluminum to cover the ball joins just enought to block the heat from the rotors

 

[Si Espanol4Yes]

I removed the fronts, and left the rears. I figured the fronts could benefit from the additional airflow. The rears (with not as much heat being generated as the fronts) I left the heat shields on to contain as much of that heat away from the motor.

With that being said, I removed the front shields on my previous K swapped Honda hatch, and experienced no deterioration of the ball joints after several track events. Sooo

 

[pgilliam1]

They make a nice place to install cooling ducts to. Just cut a hole in the top and attach the duct to it. Makes for a nice clean install. I think member "CL65 Captain" here has some photos of his on this forum. There has been a study done on reducing brake temps on this car and removing the shields resulted in the best temp reduction of any mod they tried.

 

[MrTwo]

Thanks to everyone for all the info! I should have stated this was only for the front splash guards the rears are staying put.

I saw CL65 Captain's setup when I was searching and I like it but it was way overkill for what I need.

 

[SFNSXguy]

Took all four off 15 years ago... Lots of track days, lots of road miles -- no issues.

(sent from Barcelona, Spain on my iPad!)

 

[RYU]

+1 on not removing the rears. One of my CV boots burst open before and guess where a lot of that grease went.....