Big brake kits

[thexav]

Are big brake kits with fatter disks? Or is it just larger diameter disks? How can you improve the braking on a standard car without replacing the disks or getting into lots of fiddly and expensive modifications.

What are the best or cheapest brake upgrades you can do?

 

[HDi fun]

Bigger is always better with brakes. That comes at a big price to do it properly. You'll need different calipers and carriers as well as the discs and pads.

Tarox, Rossini (not the Italian chef, later composer) and Pagid do some good kits that use uprated but standard size discs and pads. Allegedy very good.

I've never bothered with 'em because I've found stock brakes adequate on the cars I've had.

The 406 has 305mm discs up front and 288mm at the back. I've stuck to the OEM ones (ATE pads and discs) and they work extremely well. Clearly if I was thinking of putting it on the track I'd have to change to something appropriate.

 

[HDi fun]

That's apart from my short experiment with Eicher branded discs/pads. Very cheap. And bloody useless. Took 'em off after a month and supplier refunded the whole price against the proper ATE ones.

 

[old-git]

I'm with HD here. Standard brakes work very well on modern cars.

However, a cheap 'upgrade' would be to replace the OEM flexible pipes (the ones connected to the calipers) with race type steel braided or nylon pipes. These don't stretch under heavy braking so give a much better feel to the peddle as well as improving response.

Don't fall into the trap of fitting "race" pads into a standard system. These need to be hot before they work properly so will probably make your braking worse

On old cars, the simple trick of changing the fluid can have a dramatic effect on the cars braking efficiency. Conventional glycol-based brake fluid is hygroscopic, which means that it absorbs water. This is important, in order to keep condensation in the brake system from causing corrosion. However, eventually, the fluid will absorb all the moisture it can hold, reaching its point of saturation.

Several things can happen at this point. Unabsorbed moisture can begin to collect in the system, causing corrosion in critical areas; the water can cause seals to swell and deteriorate, further contaminating the fluid; and the boiling point of of the fluid drops beyond recommended levels.

This means that under high-heat braking conditions, such as during hard braking or repeated brake application while descending a mountain, the fluid will start boiling sooner, which will reduce braking performance. The pedal can begin to feel spongy, and as braking efficiency drops, it takes longer to stop the vehicle. Phew!

 

[Sid447]

Are big brake kits with fatter disks? Or is it just larger diameter disks? How can you improve the braking on a standard car without replacing the disks or getting into lots of fiddly and expensive modifications.
What are the best or cheapest brake upgrades you can do?

Better braking comes from both larger diameter and thicker discs. Making the discs wider means more metal mass so that it can absorb more heat.

The easiest economical up-grade to a braking system is to have the system flushed and re-filled with either Dot 4/600 (some companies call it Super Dot 4) or the ABS compatable Dot 5.1

Once this is done try and find a set of decent quality high-performance brake pads:
Ferodo TS2000 are very good as are AP/Lockheed, Mintex, and a few others.
Try a search on the Demontweeks website.

 

[turbonutter69]

I'm with HD here. Standard brakes work very well on modern cars.

However, a cheap 'upgrade' would be to replace the OEM flexible pipes (the ones connected to the calipers) with race type steel braided or nylon pipes. These don't stretch under heavy braking so give a much better feel to the peddle as well as improving response.

Don't fall into the trap of fitting "race" pads into a standard system. These need to be hot before they work properly so will probably make your braking worse

On old cars, the simple trick of changing the fluid can have a dramatic effect on the cars braking efficiency. Conventional glycol-based brake fluid is hygroscopic, which means that it absorbs water. This is important, in order to keep condensation in the brake system from causing corrosion. However, eventually, the fluid will absorb all the moisture it can hold, reaching its point of saturation.

Several things can happen at this point. Unabsorbed moisture can begin to collect in the system, causing corrosion in critical areas; the water can cause seals to swell and deteriorate, further contaminating the fluid; and the boiling point of of the fluid drops beyond recommended levels.

This means that under high-heat braking conditions, such as during hard braking or repeated brake application while descending a mountain, the fluid will start boiling sooner, which will reduce braking performance. The pedal can begin to feel spongy, and as braking efficiency drops, it takes longer to stop the vehicle. Phew!

You shrunk in the wash OG?

 

[old-git]

You shrunk in the wash OG?

Ooooooo, don't know what happened there

 

[turbonutter69]

You turned the temp up too much....

 

[thexav]

Whats the difference between the dot 5.1 superdot 4 and standard brake fluid then Sid?

 

[Sid447]

Whats the difference between the dot 5.1 superdot 4 and standard brake fluid then Sid?

http://www.driverstechnologyassociation.co.uk/brakes-discs-pads-calipers.htm