With all due respect to your undoubted enthusiasm, it is possible your "experimenting" would have cost your company $$$ in terms of brake and tyre wear and tear not to mention hot brakes and risk of tyre failure.
Best accept what the performance manual gives you and leave the experimenting to the test pilots?
Carbon brakes: the majority of wear is in the taxi out. Interestingly, the harder you use them, the less the subsequent wear. So no, not really.
Landing at empty ferry weights is very different from doing the same at MLW, in terms of Vref, stresses and energy dissipation.
I feel it beneficial in the long run to (safely) explore the handling envelope of any aircraft I fly, in case one day I should need use of one of the corners: at least I’ve been there or thereabouts and know what to expect. Simulators are good for a lot of that but sometimes the real thing is better.
