Here's my brakes?

[IRON-E]

I spoke to an older man, who seems to be pretty knowledgeable about the information he gave me. I inquired about brakes and callipers for better stopping power. This is what he told me., that if I wanted to do a straight bolt on calliper upgrade on my 88is, all I had to do was change my e30 callipers in front to e36 callipers and put in some steel braided brake lines, he said I could keep my 4lug disk except that he also recomended cross drilled rotors for better stopping and cooling not sloted?. anyway has anyone else heard of this? I mean it could probably work as long as you put some half inch spacers to clear the wheels and I can understand the part about not touching the rear at all unless you want to change the OEM rotors to the drilled as well. Can anyone please clear me on this one, I come across e36 callipers at the junkyard all the time if it's possible, this will be my next mod..................



Thanx in advance guys.

[jlevie]

A much cheaper alternative to E36 brakes is simply better brake pads. The brakes on an E30 are fully up to race performance when the correct pads (and plain rotors) are used.

[whiltebeitel]

I spoke to an older man, who seems to be pretty knowledgeable about the information he gave me. I inquired about brakes and callipers for better stopping power. This is what he told me., that if I wanted to do a straight bolt on calliper upgrade on my 88is, all I had to do was change my e30 callipers in front to e36 callipers and put in some steel braided brake lines, he said I could keep my 4lug disk except that he also recomended cross drilled rotors for better stopping and cooling not sloted?. anyway has anyone else heard of this? I mean it could probably work as long as you put some half inch spacers to clear the wheels and I can understand the part about not touching the rear at all unless you want to change the OEM rotors to the drilled as well. Can anyone please clear me on this one, I come across e36 callipers at the junkyard all the time if it's possible, this will be my next mod..................



Thanx in advance guys.

For the love of all things holy, don't get cross-drilled rotors for perfomance. OEM blanks do the job fine.

[IRON-E]

A much cheaper alternative to E36 brakes is simply better brake pads. The brakes on an E30 are fully up to race performance when the correct pads (and plain rotors) are used.

so what brake pads do you recommend?

[IRON-E]

For the love of all things holy, don't get cross-drilled rotors for perfomance. OEM blanks do the job fine.

you don't think cross drilled are better and why? I'm just trying to find out for reference.

[whiltebeitel]

Try Hawk HPS for street driving. Here's a link to some good tech
here

[IRON-E]

Does anyone else have any imput on this!!!!!!!!

[whiltebeitel]

Quick question: Do you track this car at all? What are you planning on doing with it?

[PiercedE30]

Think of the rotors as a giant heat sink. If you drill holes in a heat sink it effectively means that you are removing material that can dissipate heat.

[e30polak]

Dude you need to nitrous inject your calipers and run ethanol as your brake fluid!!!

Come on Edwin you can't just bolt them on. You would need to make a bracket to space them on the rotor properly. Then you would need to find a 4lug rotor with the same relative thickness as the e36 one. Buy Brembo blank rotors, w/ hawk HPS pads, some ATE superblue fluid, and new lines if you really want. This combo stops my car good enough and I got a few more ponies under the hood then you do. Also get some nice tires, those will make a huge difference in braking as well.

[jlevie]

Cross drilled rotors are a bad idea because the holes reduce the thermal mass of the rotor, reduce the area swept by the pads, and are stress concentrators.

The reduction in swept area reduces braking forces and requires longer use of the brakes, leading to increased heating of rotors & pads. The reduction in thermal mass means that the rotors can't soak up as much heat, leading to higher rotor temperatures. And finally the holes cause uneven temperatures across the rotor and concentrate the thermal stresses. Think of the holes as initial cracks of large radius.

For a street car, Hawk HPS or Axxis Ultimates are a good choice in pads. They have good cold bite, fairly linear response, good hot friction, and will tolerate higher temps than OE (or equivalent) pads. A step up in performance would be Hawk HP+ pads, but they have a lesser cold bite, are rougher on rotors, and are noisy.

The ultimate in braking performance will be a track pad (Hawk HT10, PFC-01, etc). They are really rough on rotors, have little cold bite, and are very noisy. Basically not suitable for street use, but once hot they provide awesome braking.

[evil_twin]

So going back to the E36 calipers... I have a set of calipers sitting in my garage right now that my friend upgraded for M3 calipers.

If I run this set up, what do I need?

Rotors?
Calipers?
Stainless Steel Braided Lines?

Is that right? or can I use stock rotors?