brakes Brake set up question

[maikell77]

I am in the process of trying to turn my garage art back into a car.  The car will be pretty stripped down and have 175 hp.  I'm trying to firm up the brake choice for the car.  It will see the occasional track day and autocross but mainly be a nice weather back road burner.

 

The setup I am currently considering is manual brakes, wilwood separate master cylinders.  With the 323i vented front rotors with wilwood calipers and for the rear the 250 mm drums.

 

I know with a track car you can never have too much brakes.  Would this be safe to get me on the road and enjoying the car.  The more exotic setup with much larger from rotors and rear discs is quite a bit more.  I like the idea of this setup because calipers excepted its all stuff I can replace at a local parts store or rockauto pretty easily.

 

Other pertinent information

15x7 wheels 

205/50r15 tires (200 treadwear in the future)

box flares

interior stripped to two seats, carpet, door cards, cage

[TobyB]

Honestly, for a fast street/track car, you're just fine with the Volvo calipers and 250 rear drums.

  And owning several disc brake cars without boosters,

the 2002 booster is a very good, low boost compromise for the street. 

Unless you start really tracking it hard, you won't need the bias adjustability that dual masters gives you-

and you can do that with 22mm rear cylinders and a rear pressure limiter, too.

 

I raced on 320 front calipers and 77 rotors for 2 years, and they were 'good enough'- it's currently got the

528 calipers on it, and they're more than enough with Hawk Blues- which are very basic racing pads.

 

(of course, if you like the LOOK of the wilwoods, by all means do it.  It's just that you don't need them for braking reasons)

 

hth

 

t

 

[AceAndrew]

I partially agree with Toby.  Aside from the booster (which I would keep), your only difference from the standard setup is running the wilwood front calipers on the vented disks.  I like losing a couple pounds of unsprung weight and the general modernity of the wilwood calipers.  It's more than looks, but they certainly aren't game changers.  

 

If you look at vintage racers, nearly all have kept the stock booster (or have switched back to a stock booster).  Yes, boosterless is possible, but just not worth the trade off in my opinion.  

[maikell77]

Thanks for the information.  I am kind of locked into losing the booster due to the engine swap.  I will be going to a wilwood pedal assembly.  As far as the calipers wilwoods aren't too much more compared to rebuilt stock type.  This car is not so much about looks as going quickly and being reliable and maintainable.  I will gladly trade a bit of speed for more track time.

[Preyupy]

Pick your master cylinder size carefully.  Without a booster your effort is going to be very high with 3/4" master cylinders, I would recommend either the 5/8" (0.625") or the 0.600".  You will increase the pedal travel a bit but loose a lot of pedal effort.  I am running a 19mm (3/4") dual master cylinder (its a Mercedes Benz part) mounted on a modified pedal bucket using the original pedals.  The effort is a bit high but it does not take long to get used to it, its much harder getting back into the street car after and NOT locking up the tires the first time you step on the brakes. 

[TobyB]

Yeah, but the feel of a boosterless car on the track is almost worth it.  Until you get stuck in stop- and 45mph go in traffic...

 

If you're locked into the boosterless, then I totally agree with Byron- 5/8" masters are probably a good place to start.  Especially if you

can go with the overhung (longer, thus higher leverage) pedals.

 

t

 

[FlyingPez]

I recently saw on a build someone was doing on Instagram where they switched from the stock booster to the TII booster it was smaller in diameter. What change will that give you and does anyone sell them new?

 

Keith

[KFunk]

14 minutes ago, FlyingPez said:

I recently saw on a build someone was doing on Instagram where they switched from the stock booster to the TII booster it was smaller in diameter. What change will that give you and does anyone sell them new?

 

Keith

The tii booster is just for allowing more space for the intake, and doesn't really give a performance advantage.  It's just longer and narrower.  Guys that have switched to sidedraft carbs often use them too so that they can have more room for velocity stacks.  I just let mine rub the stock booster though, hah.

Can't get 'em new anywhere, no.  Several guys have been attempting using similar boosters, but don't think there's  been a winner yet.

Edited October 1, 2016 by KFunk