Textar Brake Pads - The Gentleman of Verona

A very exciting parcel has arrived from Italy! I wonder what’s in it?

I love a good parcel - especially when it's from abroad and DS-related

Actually I know what’s in it, I’m just trying to build some mystery and suspense.

Now if you look elsewhere, and can find them, a set of genuine original Textar brake pads is going to cost you about £250. When I was over at the Citromobile thing in Holland back in May, I found a set of Textar brake pads for just 80 Euros !! 

Lovely Textar brake pads.......

That part’s true, but there is a down side (I was just trying to build suspense again). The down side? It was a part-worn set. But they looked as good as new. They’d come from a car that had crashed.

The seller was Italian. Several attempts were made at a joke with the seller along the lines of “I hope the brakes weren’t the cause” but it was completely lost in translation. Anyway, genuine Textar brake pads for 80 Euros - bargain! I was literally counting out the money to buy them when I suddenly spotted that they didn’t have the brake wear warning light wires fitted - did you spot that? They still had the holes for the wires, but they had not been fitted and instead glue or filler was squidging out of the holes. 

Textars: with and without wires for the brake wear indicators......

Prior to the 1969 model year, IDs did not have the wiring to the dash for the brake wear indicator in their loom - it was a DS-only thing. So not all pads needed to have the corresponding wires in them.

Pre-69 ID loom without brake wires

Pre-69 DS loom with brake wires

So no wires. Money hadn’t changed hands. The pads would have been absolutely fine, but I decided to hold on to my money and keep looking for a set with the wires. The deal was off! (more suspense building again). 

I came back to the UK and, as is my way, realised that I could use those Textar pads after all……..  I realised that I could carefully remove the wires from my dead set of pads and re-fit them in the 'tunnels' of the pads I’d seen.

A plan to re-fit the wires.......

The wires are a non-critical component of the pads themselves. They don’t come under any strain or load. They simply sit there, then trigger a 'wear' warning light once the wire inside is earthed against the brake disc. The wire lies in a groove between the backing plate and the pad - a tunnel - and looks as though it is simply held in place by whatever glue is used to bind the brake pad to the backing plate.  From what I remember seeing at Ciromobile, I was gambling on the mould for all Textar pads having the wire groove in the back. I’d just need to carefully clean out the tunnels with a twist drill. I decided I could then use exhaust sealing paste as the glue for the new wires: it’s non-sticky but dries hard and is able to withstand high temperatures. It crumbles to a dust when put under pressure or scraped.

I tested the tunnel theory. I didn’t want to drill into the pad itself - for fear of weakening it. I just wanted to clean out what I was sure would be existing holes. One of my old split pads served to help me align the drill to the correct angle of the tunnel - which was helpful. What I found though, was that the body of the brake pad would block the chuck and would prevent the drill bit going deep enough to clean the holes out.....

The drill isn't long enough

I did a bit of research and found some extra long drills over in China. They are probably not the best quality but only have to do a simple job and are very cheap. Problem solved!

Solution: extra long drills......

Okay: I had a plan. I just needed to put it in to action. The parts seller at Citromobile was Italian and I vaguely remembered where his stall was. Using the programme I tried to work out who it was. 

Citromobile 2019: the stall was somewhere around here. The suspense is killing me......

I remembered an Italian guy who was always at Citromobile and always at the same place - and approximately where I remember seeing those brake pads. Stall 107 - Citro Services! I Googled them and sent off an email.

Wrong guy……I looked more closely at the Citromobile floor plan......I did a bit of digging and came up with a possible alternative name: Perencin - stall 145. He sold DS parts. There were no contact details in the Citromobile programme and a Google search of the given trade name - "Citroen DS Parts Perencin" - drew a blank - other than confirming a probable Italian connection for the name in general.

My research revealed that a "Riccardo Perencin" had also had a stall at the ICCR up at Harrogate a few years ago, but again no contact details. Even though I was narrowing in on a name, I was still struggling for contact details and Riccardo seems to have a low internet profile. I think the breakthrough came from some old forum posts on a German DS site. Riccardo is based in Verona. More digging and I finally came up with a possible email address.

After some heavy use of Google translate and few emails, the deal was back on! The purchase was made and the pads have now arrived. I’m very pleased with them. They have just over 14mm of pad depth on them. I compared that to a brand-new, un-used set of Ferodo pads that I have: they have less than 12mm pad depth from new.

Textar (on the left) still has good pad depth

And, just as I remembered it to be, these Textar pads do indeed have the little holes where the brake-wear indicator wires go - they’ve just been filled in. 

You can see the hole where the wear indicator wire should go

In all other respects, they’re the same as my old Textar pads and carry the same part number.

My drill bits are currently on a slow boat. As soon as they arrive  I will set to work fitting those wires. I’ll keep you posted.