10:23 26-10-2025

How Brembo crafts carbon racing brakes for F1, IMSA and Le Mans

Go behind the scenes at Brembo to see how carbon racing brakes are made—from needling and chemical vapor infiltration to 3D checks—powering F1, IMSA and Le Mans

Behind the scenes at Brembo in the Italian town of Curno, brakes are crafted that can rein in Formula 1, IMSA, and Le Mans racers. It all starts with fuzzy carbon blanks—fiber doughnuts that look more like cloth polishing wheels than components for a hypercar.

The first stage is the Needler machine, driving thousands of needles to compress 40 layers of carbon into a dense ring. The blank then goes into a furnace, where at up to 1,500 degrees Celsius carbon gases permeate the fiber structure in a process known as chemical vapor infiltration. That’s how the brand’s famed carbon discs take shape.

After heat treatment, the blanks undergo multi-axis machining, where each disc is drilled with between 432 and 1,000 ventilation holes for optimal heat evacuation. The brake pads are produced separately: they’re softer so as not to overheat the calipers and the fluid. It’s meticulous work in the name of consistent stopping power.

Next, a robot applies an antioxidant coating, and the parts go through 3D scanning and weight checks. Each rotor receives a serialized tag that traces its journey from fiber to race track. A single set takes about four months to make, and no more than 3,000 discs are produced each year, 800 of them destined for LMDh prototypes. The cadence is deliberate rather than rushed, and it shows.

Brembo has 31 Le Mans wins to its name, a reminder that Italians can turn even carbon dust into an art form of speed and flame.