A laboratory specialising in brakes combined with a research and development centre continuously inspects the manufactured products at every stage of their production. As a result, the highest quality requirements are met, set by extremely different markets – both cold and humid Scandinavia and hot and dry Africa.

The result of the work of TOMEX engineers, as well as hundreds of hours on test tracks, is a new friction material that meets the highest legal requirements throughout the EU and ensures braking comfort in all road conditions.

Regulation ECE R-90 as part of Directive 98/12 / EC on braking devices, which entered into force on January 1, 1999 and has been obligatorily applied since April 2001, guarantees that the parameters of friction linings for disc and drum brakes may differ from the original ones only by +/- 15% maximum. Thus, TOMEX’s compliance with all the requirements of the ECE-R90 regulation is a guarantee of the highest quality.

BRAKE PERFORMANCE

The graph shows the comparative performance characteristics of the TOMEX front axle wheel brake lining with the original equipment brake lining.
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To meet further challenges, the TOMEX laboratory has developed a compound in which the proportion of heavy metals has been reduced to a minimum and all the formulations of the friction materials used are precisely tailored to the specific characteristics of each vehicle, thus ensuring the highest level of brake control, long service life, quiet operation and minimisation of excessive and aggressive dirt on the rims.

The TOMEX pads also pass such difficult tests as the high-load test and the Alpine test, during which 12 minutes of continuous braking is carried out on a road with a gradient of up to 20% and the temperature of the pads reaches 850°C under these conditions. C. This is to ensure maximum safety and that the performance of the TOMEX brake pads is as close as possible to that of the original equipment. In addition to the extremely rigorous laboratory tests for each reference introduced, a number of road tests are carried out at special test centres in Poland, as well as at the RDW Test Centre Lelystad in the Netherlands.

FADING

One of the key steps in the AK-Master test is to assess the temperature dependence of the coefficient of friction. The graph below shows a comparison between the TOMEX material and the OE material during ‘fading’ braking, i.e. measuring the effect of increasing temperature on braking performance.
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braking cycles

Each month, the laboratory performs more than 100 different tests and examinations, not only on finished products but also on individual components, in order to guarantee the highest quality of the final product.

Temperature is an indispensable part of the braking process in any vehicle. In the tests, we heat the discs to red-hot heat, which is well over 1,000°C.

The launch of the new reference is preceded by hundreds of hours not only in the Laboratory but also on test tracks in Poland, Germany and the UK.