(My son woke me at 4:45 am and I can’t sleep… so let’s write a novel)
Wilwood will have a front kit that fits under stock wheels around end of summer.
These trucks are unusually nose heavy for a modern truck. Shockingly manufacturers are able to get close to a 48/52 if not better.
Anyways, being nose heavy and the dive built in, these trucks do rely on fronts quite heavily. (Yes almost every vehicle relays on the front brake portion to do 80-90-% of the stopping or rather speed to heat transfer.) I’m not saying that this truck doesn’t need rear brake upgrade. The rotors are so thin and the truck uses massive traction control offroad… and on. Even when you think it’s off.
So a front only kit will return massive dividends..
And then it comes down to what’s important.
1) rotor capability. The stock discs are thin. The do use a good material with high carbon steel which is the heat holder. But… because they are thin they get “full” very quickly. A thicker rotor is needed more than a larger diameter. Good material on stock replacements is key. So is vein design. I think I have convinced raybestos to make the r-300 rotor for our trucks. Due out late summer. But for bbk, budget rotors (even on 2 piece rotors) can suck. Generic vein design is a give away and will probably lead toward cheaper material. If the brake company can’t tell you what their rotor is made of that’s a telltale it was made to a dollar factor. They will usually quote a rotor type. Like wilwoods current high end rotor material that I can’t recall at the moment.
2) knuckle ridgidity. (No I can’t spell that correctly) anyone here besides @Westphalracing experience brake pad knock back? It’s literally when the tire/wheel assembly flexes the knuckle and the rotor pushes the pads open in the caliper. Then when you go to press the brakes, the pedal is long because you have to take up the slack. On some vehicles it will manifest itself into a stiff pedal with a pine wood block brake pad quality feel. Where you are literally fighting the knuckle flexing and using the rotor to push the pad as you are trying to engage the brakes. Instant cooking the pad so no Mu.
So basically the more the knuckle flexes the more important it is to have a stiff caliper and well thought out radial mount or well thought out tab mount. Wether a two piece caliper with floating springs is better than a single piece rotor? Hmmm. I need coffee before that discussion.
And also does the caliper come with little springs inside the pistons to kick that pad back and keep it right where it’s supposed to be?
We have 35’s stock. That is a lot of leverage and the taller the tire, and the grippier the tire the worse the chance of this.
3) caliper stiffness. Bridge bolts? Bridges? Single piece, soft iron, stiff iron, same for aluminum. Big brake kits with crap calipers are just that. Wilwood had a horrible rep and still can’t get away from the “racers don’t let friends race with wilwoods” because they used to only make flexible calipers made for a budget. They make great calipers now. Some stiffer than others, and a couple lines are clearly for budget and would not be the greatest.
There are a few brake companies that just use a single caliper design that they came up with a decade ago and use that because people don’t know better. Caliper flex is real and just like rubber brake lines, you don’t realize how much it affects things intil
You install lines that don’t flex.
Same with calipers. Go from a crap caliper with “x” piston area to a good caliper with the same piston area. And the pedal is more controllable, stiff, allows better modulation.
Speaking of which. Did the bbk company match the piston areas correctly? Or just throw their “close enough” or “truck” caliper on.
But back to caliper flex, a 6600# truck, with us getting on the binders, I think the front caliper piston area is between 5-6 sq inches, (57mmx2 floating caliper, someone can do the math), and then the power master with the abs pump giving more pressure boost. That’s a lot of hydraulic pressure flexing. And a little flex has a lot of loss.
4) pad swept area. And pad shape, allowing for a good pad quality.
At the end of the day. I really want to put a dial on the rotora 18” wheel brake kit and see how that front caliper does. Its sad they went with that iron caliper. But… it doesn’t mean it’s bad. Just for the money…
I think the wilwood stock wheel kit coming will be the happy medium that cures 90% of the problem. But won’t have that ultimate cures all of a full brake kit.
Wilwood will have a front kit that fits under stock wheels around end of summer.
These trucks are unusually nose heavy for a modern truck. Shockingly manufacturers are able to get close to a 48/52 if not better.
Anyways, being nose heavy and the dive built in, these trucks do rely on fronts quite heavily. (Yes almost every vehicle relays on the front brake portion to do 80-90-% of the stopping or rather speed to heat transfer.) I’m not saying that this truck doesn’t need rear brake upgrade. The rotors are so thin and the truck uses massive traction control offroad… and on. Even when you think it’s off.
So a front only kit will return massive dividends..
And then it comes down to what’s important.
1) rotor capability. The stock discs are thin. The do use a good material with high carbon steel which is the heat holder. But… because they are thin they get “full” very quickly. A thicker rotor is needed more than a larger diameter. Good material on stock replacements is key. So is vein design. I think I have convinced raybestos to make the r-300 rotor for our trucks. Due out late summer. But for bbk, budget rotors (even on 2 piece rotors) can suck. Generic vein design is a give away and will probably lead toward cheaper material. If the brake company can’t tell you what their rotor is made of that’s a telltale it was made to a dollar factor. They will usually quote a rotor type. Like wilwoods current high end rotor material that I can’t recall at the moment.
2) knuckle ridgidity. (No I can’t spell that correctly) anyone here besides @Westphalracing experience brake pad knock back? It’s literally when the tire/wheel assembly flexes the knuckle and the rotor pushes the pads open in the caliper. Then when you go to press the brakes, the pedal is long because you have to take up the slack. On some vehicles it will manifest itself into a stiff pedal with a pine wood block brake pad quality feel. Where you are literally fighting the knuckle flexing and using the rotor to push the pad as you are trying to engage the brakes. Instant cooking the pad so no Mu.
So basically the more the knuckle flexes the more important it is to have a stiff caliper and well thought out radial mount or well thought out tab mount. Wether a two piece caliper with floating springs is better than a single piece rotor? Hmmm. I need coffee before that discussion.
And also does the caliper come with little springs inside the pistons to kick that pad back and keep it right where it’s supposed to be?
We have 35’s stock. That is a lot of leverage and the taller the tire, and the grippier the tire the worse the chance of this.
3) caliper stiffness. Bridge bolts? Bridges? Single piece, soft iron, stiff iron, same for aluminum. Big brake kits with crap calipers are just that. Wilwood had a horrible rep and still can’t get away from the “racers don’t let friends race with wilwoods” because they used to only make flexible calipers made for a budget. They make great calipers now. Some stiffer than others, and a couple lines are clearly for budget and would not be the greatest.
There are a few brake companies that just use a single caliper design that they came up with a decade ago and use that because people don’t know better. Caliper flex is real and just like rubber brake lines, you don’t realize how much it affects things intil
You install lines that don’t flex.
Same with calipers. Go from a crap caliper with “x” piston area to a good caliper with the same piston area. And the pedal is more controllable, stiff, allows better modulation.
Speaking of which. Did the bbk company match the piston areas correctly? Or just throw their “close enough” or “truck” caliper on.
But back to caliper flex, a 6600# truck, with us getting on the binders, I think the front caliper piston area is between 5-6 sq inches, (57mmx2 floating caliper, someone can do the math), and then the power master with the abs pump giving more pressure boost. That’s a lot of hydraulic pressure flexing. And a little flex has a lot of loss.
4) pad swept area. And pad shape, allowing for a good pad quality.
At the end of the day. I really want to put a dial on the rotora 18” wheel brake kit and see how that front caliper does. Its sad they went with that iron caliper. But… it doesn’t mean it’s bad. Just for the money…
I think the wilwood stock wheel kit coming will be the happy medium that cures 90% of the problem. But won’t have that ultimate cures all of a full brake kit.
