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Big brake kits BBK’s

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I'll speculate on behalf of the member you're quoting.

If you're not using up 100% of the available 'meat on the bone' for each item (ie brakes with pad life, rotor thermal mass, or even the amount of gas you keep on board) then you've left time on the table as lighter = faster (given every other variable remains the same).

The point of racing is to be first - if you're packing around a ton (well, maybe a couple hundred pounds) of weight needlessly then you're going to be slower. If you 'time' it so that all of your consumables run out just as you cross the finish, well then you left nothing on the table and were as fast as you could have possibly been (a racers dream!).
I’d rather have equipment left late in a run or race then trying to make a dash with worn out equipment. Confidence in the car is huge and when your brake zones very every lap and you try and still push 10/10ths that’s when you go off and wreck. No way to predict how much you have left when they fall off so dramatically you don’t know how much pedal you have.
 


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Someone should create a brake thread with P#s for what works and what doesnt for a resource. Even if you have a BBK all info and thoughts are welcome.

Sent from my SM-N950U1 using Tapatalk
If I have time I might go and aggregate some of the threads and make a guide that includes prices, pros and cons ect.
 


Woods247

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If I have time I might go and aggregate some of the threads and make a guide that includes prices, pros and cons ect.
I'll post up my specs. Only a few of us run the ST40 caliper but those that are considering it need to now the compatibility issues. There are great advantages to this kit though, inexpensive pads for heavy track usage being one of them.
 


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Also... I took a trip to the local car parts yard at lunch and found a unicorn focus svt with brakes still intact! Brought my tools and thought it would be a quick job but unfortunately the pistons were seized, and they are rusted to shit so a ton of prying and swearing later I have the first part of my brake upgrade.
Anyone have any tips on cleaning them up and repainting them, also the where can I find the slider pins and boots to replace the old ones?
20200218_143217.jpg
 


Messages
92
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122
Location
Albany, NY, USA
Also... I took a trip to the local car parts yard at lunch and found a unicorn focus svt with brakes still intact! Brought my tools and thought it would be a quick job but unfortunately the pistons were seized, and they are rusted to shit so a ton of prying and swearing later I have the first part of my brake upgrade.
Anyone have any tips on cleaning them up and repainting them, also the where can I find the slider pins and boots to replace the old ones?
View attachment 27998
Your ST slide pins and boots will work just fine with the svt bracket 😃 congrats on the find
 


Messages
92
Likes
122
Location
Albany, NY, USA
I'll post up my specs. Only a few of us run the ST40 caliper but those that are considering it need to now the compatibility issues. There are great advantages to this kit though, inexpensive pads for heavy track usage being one of them.
Can you give some more info on this setup?
 


TyphoonFiST

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Also... I took a trip to the local car parts yard at lunch and found a unicorn focus svt with brakes still intact! Brought my tools and thought it would be a quick job but unfortunately the pistons were seized, and they are rusted to shit so a ton of prying and swearing later I have the first part of my brake upgrade.
Anyone have any tips on cleaning them up and repainting them, also the where can I find the slider pins and boots to replace the old ones?
View attachment 27998
If it was me....I get them blasted and powder coated! Lucky Duck!

Sent from my SM-N950U1 using Tapatalk
 


OP
MRX430
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Thread Starter #109
Also... I took a trip to the local car parts yard at lunch and found a unicorn focus svt with brakes still intact! Brought my tools and thought it would be a quick job but unfortunately the pistons were seized, and they are rusted to shit so a ton of prying and swearing later I have the first part of my brake upgrade.
Anyone have any tips on cleaning them up and repainting them, also the where can I find the slider pins and boots to replace the old ones?
View attachment 27998
TDavis' Platinum Warrior build

Restored the SVT rear caliper brackets to their formal glory after an acid bath and polishing. Also painted the rotors as the factory Ford ones do not come with a black rotor hat.
 


TDavis

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Also... I took a trip to the local car parts yard at lunch and found a unicorn focus svt with brakes still intact! Brought my tools and thought it would be a quick job but unfortunately the pistons were seized, and they are rusted to shit so a ton of prying and swearing later I have the first part of my brake upgrade.
Anyone have any tips on cleaning them up and repainting them, also the where can I find the slider pins and boots to replace the old ones?
View attachment 27998
Check out my build thread. I used some Evapo-Rust and a wire brush on a regular hand drill to make them look new
 


Woods247

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Can you give some more info on this setup?
Sure. I have the StopTech 83.343.4300.71 Front Big Brake Kit along with the Ford Focus SVT rear caliper brackets and StopTech 126.61074SL/SR rear slotted rotors. I use StopTech 309.06090 Street Performance Front Brake Pads in the front and StopTech 309.08860 Street Performance Rear Brake Pads in the rear for track. The front pads cost $64.15 rear pads are $50.99 on Amazon. I paid around $220.00 online for the rear rotors. Front replacement rings are extremely expensive but after two seasons, they’re still fine. I’ve been using Type 200 fluid since the car was new. I also built custom ducts, which you can see on my build page. I’d have to confirm with my logbook, but I likely have over 25 track hours on these brakes along with trips to/from the tracks toting my little tire trailer. In all that time, I’ve changed the front pads twice and rear pads four times. Crazy.

My home tracks are Road Atlanta, Barber and Atlanta Motorsports Park. To give an idea of my pace, I usually run around 1:46 at Road Atlanta on 200TW tires. Spec Miata is a bit quicker at around 1:43. Aero and lateral grip are the car's biggest problems at the moment. AMP is brutal on brakes because it's technical and there isn’t a long straight to cool them. Before the BBK upgrade I’d suffer fade after 2-2.5 hot laps at AMP. I never pushed above 7/10 there or Barber because fade came on quick. With the current brake setup, I can easily run my sessions as fast as I'm mentally comfortable going, without concern for brake issues. I usually get at least one to two laps at 10/10 if I grid early.
Adding a Limited Slip Diff (I have the MFactory from Whooshmotorsports) significantly reduces brake stress as well. Torque Vectoring cannot be disabled in this car. Without the LSD my front brakes would constantly fight for traction at turn exit. I have no idea how I tracked this car without a LSD for so long.

Here’s the bad part: The brakes are huge. You have to run a 17” wheel at minimum. Most 4x108 wheels won’t fit without custom spacers. TDavis is running the Stoptech kit and proved Team Dynamics 1.2 will fit without spacers. Maybe he will comment with the exact specs. I have a few sets of wheels and all required spacers, which I had custom made by Motorsport-Tech.com. There is more detail about this on my build page as well. I would prefer a 16” wheel and more tire but it is impossible with this BBK. The cost of consumables is simply too good to justify a change. If you have any other questions, please let me know.
 


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Canada
Woods247 which LSD did you go with? How do you like it?

You have a similar brake set up to mine, running Stoptech BBK was on G-locks but making the change over the PFC 11 compound. For the rear I am running a focus caliper with the stock diameter rotor and PFC 08 compound pads (may try 11s). Are you chasing a braking stability issue where it likes to loosen up while threshold braking?
 


Woods247

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Woods247 which LSD did you go with? How do you like it?

You have a similar brake set up to mine, running Stoptech BBK was on G-locks but making the change over the PFC 11 compound. For the rear I am running a focus caliper with the stock diameter rotor and PFC 08 compound pads (may try 11s). Are you chasing a braking stability issue where it likes to loosen up while threshold braking?
I have the MFactory LSD. No complaints at all with it. As for stability issues, yes but only when decelerating heavily from high speed. When I mat the brakes to ABS threshold from 130mph to 50ish it wags the tail a bit. I increased the size of my rear wing and it seemed to help some but I need more track time to be certain. I only have a few hours with the new wing... I think I should try a more aggressive rear pad and see if that helps a bit more with bias. Increasing the rear rotor size definitely helped. The car has such a short wheelbase and it's so nose heavy, I'm not sure I'll every be able to dial it out completely. I do find that the quicker I get the car slowed down, the straighter it tracks.
 


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M-Sport fan

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I’ve been using Type 200 fluid since the car was new.
I understand that you may not care about this (and for track use most likely don't), but the Typ 200 NOT being an LV fluid, does it have ANY ill effects on the ABS/nanny functions at all??

So many on here tell everyone, unless they ARE actually open tracking the car, to stick with a DOT 4 LV fluid (to retain the proper ABS/nanny system functions), but I want to use the Typ 200 even for pure street use, due to it's higher wet/dry boiling points, and much better than most (ALL?) other DOT 4 fluids, ANTI-hygroscopic properties. [:)]
 


Woods247

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I understand that you may not care about this (and for track use most likely don't), but the Typ 200 NOT being an LV fluid, does it have ANY ill effects on the ABS/nanny functions at all??

So many on here tell everyone, unless they ARE actually open tracking the car, to stick with a DOT 4 LV fluid (to retain the proper ABS/nanny system functions), but I want to use the Typ 200 even for pure street use, due to it's higher wet/dry boiling points, and much better than most (ALL?) other DOT 4 fluids, ANTI-hygroscopic properties. [:)]
Yeah I don't really understand what you're talking about. My ABS works fine. I flush it frequently so water/moisture isn't an issue. My car isn't daily driven. I don't put Type 200 in my street cars haha. That would be a waste of money.
 


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...So many on here tell everyone, unless they ARE actually open tracking the car, to stick with a DOT 4 LV fluid (to retain the proper ABS/nanny system functions), but I want to use the Type 200 even for pure street use, due to it's higher wet/dry boiling points, and much better than most (ALL?) other DOT 4 fluids, ANTI-hygroscopic properties. [:)]
Interesting - I hadn't heard that before...I was going to switch out to RBF600 when it got warmer, to run throughout the year, even though I only plan on lightly tracking this car a couple times during the summer.
 


TDavis

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Sure. I have the StopTech 83.343.4300.71 Front Big Brake Kit along with the Ford Focus SVT rear caliper brackets and StopTech 126.61074SL/SR rear slotted rotors. I use StopTech 309.06090 Street Performance Front Brake Pads in the front and StopTech 309.08860 Street Performance Rear Brake Pads in the rear for track. The front pads cost $64.15 rear pads are $50.99 on Amazon. I paid around $220.00 online for the rear rotors. Front replacement rings are extremely expensive but after two seasons, they’re still fine. I’ve been using Type 200 fluid since the car was new. I also built custom ducts, which you can see on my build page. I’d have to confirm with my logbook, but I likely have over 25 track hours on these brakes along with trips to/from the tracks toting my little tire trailer. In all that time, I’ve changed the front pads twice and rear pads four times. Crazy.

My home tracks are Road Atlanta, Barber and Atlanta Motorsports Park. To give an idea of my pace, I usually run around 1:46 at Road Atlanta on 200TW tires. Spec Miata is a bit quicker at around 1:43. Aero and lateral grip are the car's biggest problems at the moment. AMP is brutal on brakes because it's technical and there isn’t a long straight to cool them. Before the BBK upgrade I’d suffer fade after 2-2.5 hot laps at AMP. I never pushed above 7/10 there or Barber because fade came on quick. With the current brake setup, I can easily run my sessions as fast as I'm mentally comfortable going, without concern for brake issues. I usually get at least one to two laps at 10/10 if I grid early.
Adding a Limited Slip Diff (I have the MFactory from Whooshmotorsports) significantly reduces brake stress as well. Torque Vectoring cannot be disabled in this car. Without the LSD my front brakes would constantly fight for traction at turn exit. I have no idea how I tracked this car without a LSD for so long.

Here’s the bad part: The brakes are huge. You have to run a 17” wheel at minimum. Most 4x108 wheels won’t fit without custom spacers. TDavis is running the Stoptech kit and proved Team Dynamics 1.2 will fit without spacers. Maybe he will comment with the exact specs. I have a few sets of wheels and all required spacers, which I had custom made by Motorsport-Tech.com. There is more detail about this on my build page as well. I would prefer a 16” wheel and more tire but it is impossible with this BBK. The cost of consumables is simply too good to justify a change. If you have any other questions, please let me know.
Yeah, my Team Dynamics Pro Race 1.2s fit without spacers. They're 17x8 with a 38mm offset. I feel alot of the reason they fit is also because the spoke design. I also feel you could get a 40mm or even a 42mm offset wheel of the same wheel and it would fit. I've noticed on the bigger diameter TD Pro Race wheels they have convex spoke design(the spokes go outward), on the smaller diameter Pro Race wheels like 15" and 16" they are more of a concave design, especially on the 15" wheels. As far as brake setup, me and @Woods247 setup is identical

Check my build thread for the clearance. I can fit my fingers easily between the caliper and spokes. I was surprised, as all the people I saw previously with the Stoptech BBK haven't gotten a wheel to fit without spacers. I decided to be the guinea pig for my set of wheels since no one had tried the TD wheels at that time. I believe I'm also the only one who has the stock wheels with the BBK as well. Obviously I have a spacer, 26mm spacer at that.

If you need info on spacers I can tell you that if you want quality spacers go to Motorsport-tech.com. Thats where I got mine, I can see @Woods247 used them as well. I've gotten a set from them for my car in the past and they great quality
 


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shouldbeasy

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Interesting - I hadn't heard that before...I was going to switch out to RBF600 when it got warmer, to run throughout the year, even though I only plan on lightly tracking this car a couple times during the summer.
I run RBF600 all year with no issues - works well enough for me...
 


M-Sport fan

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Interesting - I hadn't heard that before...I was going to switch out to RBF600 when it got warmer, to run throughout the year, even though I only plan on lightly tracking this car a couple times during the summer.
Most of the pure racing, very high temp brake fluids (with the exception of the 'liquid gold' co$ting Castrol React) actually take on moisture MUCH quicker than even a 'pedestrian' street fluid like the Motorcraft OEM fill, despite their higher wet boiling points. [:(]
The logic/expectation is that it will be bled, and flushed out MUCH MORE often for a track use car (which it was designed for) than a street car owner would ever do, so hence, hygroscopicity is not a major concern with these companies (save for the Castrol, which does carry the highest WET boiling point available out there).
 


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