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DBA is an Australian manufacturer of high performance brake upgrades for passenger vehicles and race cars. Tracing their origins back to the 1970’s, DBA have been a well recognised brand in Australia for almost half a century, but are a relative newcomer to Europe. Let’s take a look at what makes this Silverwater, Australia-based company special and worthy of fitting to your 4WD.
There are many brake brands in the market today, particularly when it comes to passenger cars and performance applications – but surprisingly there are few brake specialists in the 4×4 world. Too often, products are marketed as being “high performance” when in fact their characteristics suggest that they are merely OE-equivalent parts in fancy packaging.
As Australia’s largest brake rotor manufacturer and a significant player in motorsport worldwide, DBA’s motto is “made, not bought”. Their products are unique to the brand, and throughout their design and manufacture they feature innovations to make them more durable, harder wearing, quieter and, crucially for braking systems, more thermally efficient. DBA braking systems offer up to 30% increases in stopping power for many applications, and up to a 20% increase in cooling efficiency – for a braking improvement which the driver will notice and corresponding safety and performance benefits.
One common customer question is, “why would I need to upgrade my brakes – surely the vehicle manufacturer’s brakes are fine for my needs?” The answer is pretty simple – car manufacturers fit the most cost-effective parts to keep the cost of selling a new car or van as low as possible. Whilst they have legal responsibilities to offer safe braking systems, these systems are only designed to meet basic standards and nothing more. No vehicle is beyond upgrading, and in the 4WD market in particular, users add heavy modifications or loads such as steel bumper, winches, larger wheels and tyres, roof tents and racks, camping gear, tools for work or for off-road recovery, and far more besides.
The DBA range contains many hundreds of products, the best-known being brake rotors or discs, brake pads, shoes and calipers. There are many ways in which DBA parts vary from standard vehicle components, but here are some examples of the innovations we can offer with this highly respected brand.
In their simplest form, brake discs, or rotors as they are commonly known, are heavy iron discs which rotate along with the road wheels. DBA took the basic design principles and improved them with a unique “kangaroo paw” internal ventilation system, also adding specially developed surface grooves to their T2 and T3 slotted rotors. The product was then manufactured in high precision conditions, using high carbon iron alloys and utilising the same equipment which is used for world-leading race teams, thus permitting extremely fine manufacturing tolerances for reduced noise and vibration.
Likewise, DBA’s innovations were carried over to their brake pads. Whilst many users think of ceramic pads as a high performance upgrade, this material is the lowest spec offering available – with carbon and metallic compounds taking centre stage. Don’t ask for the recipe as it is a closely guarded secret, but DBA pads are far removed from the humble pads which your manufacturer fitted from new.
A huge range is available from DBA for vehicles including the Ford Ranger, Toyota Hilux and Land Cruiser, Navara, D-Max, Patrol, Shogun, Amarok and many more.
4×4 Works are proud to be the UK’s largest distributor of DBA 4WD products, with the largest range and a deep understanding of the products available. We can help you find a worthy brake upgrade for trade or leisure users, whether on or off road.
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