Brake upgrades

I'm just curious what some of you FI guys are running on and recommendations. I could definitely use some better brakes. I'm considering the Wilwood fronts from Goodwin. I have a 99 with non-sport brakes at the moment.

Depends on your pocketbook. If you wanna get spendy, the Wilwoods are a fine choice. If you wanna go the economical route, find some used sport brakes for the front, add better pads and fluid, and that will go a long way toward solving your braking problems.

Speaking of, why do you think your current set-up is inadequate?

I have a Wilwood BBK set used that might be for sale...

What pads are you running? Decent pads should be okay for street use with FI.

Agreed, I have the Wilwood BBK up front which is total overkill. I like how easy it is to change pads and the pads cost about 40% less than the Mazda pads. Besides that, a good Hawk HP+ pad and bleed with Motul RBF600 should be fine for any FI street car. If you are going to track it AND find the HP+ are not holding up, then upgrade to a DTC-60 for the track and run the HP+ on the street.

The Wilwoods are great for bling factor, easy to swap pads and cheaper to run. If you do A LOT of track days and like the easy to swap and cheaper pads and/or are running on the edge of the stock brakes running DTC60, then upgrade to the BBK.

That being said, I actually love the stopping power of the Wilwood BBK. The stopping power is a noticeable improvement, even on the street. I've had to do a few quick stops and with the Wilwood proportioning valve adjusted to more rear bias, the brakes are AMAZING!!! I have this kit. Forget the cross-drilled and slotted rotor. Go with the plain one or if you want to REALLY splurge and you're a track whore, get the Trackspeed Engineering kit. With it's uber-cheap rotors it's what all the cool track rats are running.

I run StopTech Street Performance pads on meticulously maintained 1.8 brakes. Sub $35 for a set of front pads on RockAuto. Mu ~0.4. MOT ~1300°F!! Feel is consistent through the temperature range. You might say these are Carbotech XP7s for 1/3 the price - better than AX6, not as good as XP8.

Add race fluid to the mix.

These are more than adequate for street use and will handle up to Intermediate level HPDE at MSR-C. I'm ~200HP on 205/50R15 Rivals. I run in Driver's Edge Yellow Group. Regretfully, I'm finally outgrowing these pads on track, but they were one heck of a deal while I learned.

You do want to be careful about keeping both ends matched, i.e. stopping power, pads, & prop valve; and with the proper master and booster for pedal travel and pressures.
See Keith Tanners posts on the big board.

On the 318ti board one guy did some very controlled testing and found the most common upgrade for that car, putting bigger 325 rotors and calipers only on the front actually increased the stopping distances because it messed with the proportions and made the rears useless.

awesome ... great info! thanks!

+1 on StopTech Street Performance pads. Best bang for the buck for aggressive street/autox/light track pads.

I run them on my miata and the heavy minivan with undersized brakes. They are good to go from the first stop in freezing temperature, a must for DD pads IMO.

I have yet to run them on the track, but I believe they are similar to HP+ but with a slightly higher temperature fade resistance.

Dang, a BBK for less than 600 bucks? I can't even buy a decent set of pads for my car for that price!

I will say that if you add some brake ducts, the benefits are huge! I ran my s/c '94 HARD with sport brakes, Motul fluid, Hawk pads and home-brew brake ducts. No need for Wilwoods...

M

Any rotor recommendations for those running stoptech pads?

Plain old Centric blanks. Whatever is on sale. If from Rock Auto, look for same warehouse to save shipping costs. Last time I ordered, I got the fancy Cryos because they were on sale and cheaper than the regular rotors.

Thanks all for the recommendations! I ended up getting a full set of centric blanks and stoptech street performance pads. They're beded in now, and quite pleased. I have no idea what was on there before lol. As apex2apex says, initial bite is pretty good.