Have a Brake: Mintex are back-in-box!

The famous Bentley victories at Le Mans in the Thirties were secured with Mintex brake linings and years later the company mastered the new disc technology as well, securing further wins with Jaguar. Now they’re back.

Well, in reality Mintex were never really gone, neither from the motorsport scene nor the roads: But what is new is that the brand has launched a series called Mintex Classic, catering for the cars of yore – which have now become classics.

Winners of the 1928 Le Mans, Rubin and Barnato in their 4.5 Bentley with Mintex linings within the huge drums.

Fittingly, as Mintex can now look back at over 100 years of manufacturing brake systems, many of those supplying motorsport teams as well. With some tremendous names on their common victory list, we might add: Besides those most British of marques, Bentley and Jaguar, Mintex supplied brake linings and pads to the equally illustrous names of Bugatti and Ferrari.

Another winning combination: Mintex and Ecurie Ecosse Jaguar D-type.

In short, the company used motorsports as it was really beneficial in those days: To develop and test their products under the most strenous of circumstances. They backed their active engagement in the sport with an equally visible presence as a sponsor of many races, and you will very often recognize the Mintex name from large sponsor boards in the background on beautiful photos from the aforementioned Le Mans as well as many other motor races of yesteryear.

1959, Le Mans – Mintex on the cars, Mintex on the sponsor boards.

But it is in fact at least as likely that you already recognise the name from the workshop manual of your classic car – and you don’t need to drive a Bentley, Bugatti og Ferrari for that matter. Mintex was also a large supplier of Original Equipment for Manufacturers and could be found on common Fords, Austins and more.

It wasn’t all racing, of course.

Now they’re doing it again, as Mintex has launched a new line of product specifically for classic cars. Fittingly named Mintex Classic, and with the added touch that Mintex have dug that bit deeper into their rich history and have chosen to supply the new pads in a lovely metal retro-box. Once those new pads have been fitted to your cherished classic car, that box will no doubt look excellent on the garage shelf, perfectly integrated in that automotive themed corner of the living room, or even on the office desk.

The new Mintex Classic brake pads are supplied in lovely tin boxes.

The company has not forgotten their roots (and indeed that of braking!), so under the Mintex Classic name they offer a relining service for brake shoes as well. Shoe relining is quite common both in the classic car world and even commercial vehicles, of course, but Mintex takes this to the next level: They will take your old shoes, remove all the old linings and clean them up.  Then they will bond and rivet the new Mintex Competition Linings (MCL) to the shoe before the final step: To radially grind the outer circumference of the shoe to the inner diameter of the drum, to ensure there is maximum contact between your shoe and drum for the most efficient braking surface.

They have not forgotten drum brakes and the Classic Mintex service offer relining of brake shoes as well.

Both the brake pads and the linings are made up of modern and more advanced ingredients to produce the performance of today: The new Classic pads sit tightly between the Mintex red box standard pad and the flagship fast road compound ‘M1144’.  It is a low dust and noise compound that just has that edge on the standard material, but the characteristics of the fast road material. So what you get should really be the best of both worlds: The original history and a modern product.

And then there’s that tin-box packaging… fancy one? Here’s how:

The above sponsored content was brought to you by MINTEX Classic – but there’s more: One of our ViaRETRO readers will win a set of these pads – and it could be YOU! Follow this link to see how:
The Mintex / ViaRETRO Competition