quote Originally posted by spearce: Hi Kohburn The brakets I have were made from the Zettner drawings. It says that the calliper bolts are 7/16 NF. They must be cause they fit perfectly. I'm at work right now but I will check this evening and post back here. I do have an emergency brake as I am using the Cadillac rear callipers. I'm thinking of changing to your rear brakets. They look real good. I haven't made my mind up yet. The car is a fair weather car and won't be back on the road untill April so I ve got some time yet. WARNING, anyone who is going to use the Wilwood GM Metric callipers beware that you can NOT use the standard brake hoses with banjo bolts. Thje Wilwood callipers use 1/8 NPT fittings. I am having my hoses made by a friend who works at a plant that makes OEM brake lines. He has the equipment fabricate then and test them to OEM industry standards Steve

hmm.. now you've got me wonder - I can't remember how many nuts i tried on at the hardware store to confirm the thread sizing - maybe i missed something.. I'll have to double check now

OK Kohburn

I'm home now and I just checked the calliper bolts and can confirm that they are 7/16 NF ( 7/16-20 )

Steve

yep i checked again

7/16-20 thread (fine thread or NF)

so i bought matching bolts of 7/16-20 at 1" and 1.5" lengths 4 of each for front and rear respectively

I don't have any english taps - so i'll hafta get a set of those from harbor freight or an individual one from mcmaster carr

ooh yeaahhh

Well I've got the car on the road. Had an alignment done and have about 100miles on the new brakes. All I can say is WOW!!!! what an improvement from the stock brakes

Steve

I had these brackets made using the Zettner prints and they don't fit... any comments?

Here's one that's been modified to work...

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Turn the key and feel the engine shake the whole car with its lope; Plant the gas pedal and feel in your chest neither a shriek nor a wail but a bellowing roar; Lift and be pushed into the harness by compression braking that only comes from the biggest cylinders while listening to music of pops and gurgles. Know that you are driving an American V8. There are finer engines made, but none of them are this cool.

Luck, Fate and Destiny are words used by those who lack the courage to define their own future

I noticed on zettners plans that he called for 1/2" holes where it mounted to the stock knuckle but only 7/16" bolts - seems he designed in some slop rather than trying to get the hole dimensions accurate.

Presumably because he didn't expect flame cutting to be that precise... but laser cutting is.
What I'm trying to show is that the space for the caliper to fit into isn't big enough for the caliper. Is EACH of these brackets supposed to be manually fit to a caliper? or is there an extra machining operation that he specified beyond the flame cutting drawing from which I took my info?

Hi Will

This is what Mr. Zettner wrote as to the fit of the callipers

"The caliper brackets are flame cut from 3/8 inch mild steel plate. Machining consisted of drilling four holes and tapping two of them, and milling or grinding the 1/8 inch machining allowance from thrust surfaces for the calipers. "

I take it to mean that you must fit the brackets to the callipers

Steve

What he has as 1/2" holes, I have as 0.484 (clearance for 12mm - 0.472). But that's not the issue. I now notice the 1/8" "Machine Allowance" next to the dimension I had used for the width where the bracket saddled the caliper. I guess to be precise I need to go to the junk yard and measure this dimension directly from the knuckles that volunteered my cores. What seems to fit the caliper is 3.770, vice the 3.520 (1.760 * 2) from the drawing. I'll probably end up with something in the neighborhood of 3.800 to account for variation, as that's an as-cast surface on the caliper.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited 04-02-2005).]

When using REAR LeBaron rotors and 3/8" thick caliper brackets, use 0.400 thick spacers between caliper mounting ears and caliper bracket.
When using LeBaron FRONT rotors and 3/8" thick caliper brackets, use 0.800 thick spacers.

Edited for correct spacer thickness for stock knuckles.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited 05-06-2009).]

quote Originally posted by Will: When using rear LeBaron rotors and 3/8" thick caliper brackets, use 0.325 thick spacers between caliper mounting ears and caliper bracket. When using LeBaron front rotors and 3/8" thick caliper brackets, use 0.650 thick spacers.

now thats helpful information

I thought so

After several revisions, I finally got my caliper brackets just so.

As you can see, it's a snug fit around for the caliper and the Street Dreams hubs that I designed. This was done to maximize section thickness to increase strength. I think that these brackets could be made out of aluminum.
The caliper pictured is the S10 caliper discussed throughout this whole thread. Here is a pic of how the S10 and Camaro calipers differ:

The Camaro caliper is on the left and aside from the different banjo fitting location, has this "wart" on the side of it. Obviously my brackets will not work with this caliper. That's fine with me as relieving the bracket to clear this wart removes far more section thickness than it's worth. The S10 caliper thus allows the caliper bracket to be made stronger than the Camaro caliper does.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited 06-01-2005).]

Can't believe that no one here is interested in better brakes.

quote Originally posted by Will: Can't believe that no one here is interested in better brakes.

Sorry, but I really didn't want to read the whole thread. I was just at the Dells and saw many lebaron brake upgrades, and I want a set. So how much are you selling them for, and when can I get a set?

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I encourage you to read the whole thread because it describes how what I propose differs from all the conventional 11.25" brake setups that you saw at Dell's.

These brackets should be available in a couple of months.

[This message has been edited by Will (edited 06-05-2005).]

ok, I will have to read it then, I am very interested.

quote Originally posted by Will: Can't believe that no one here is interested in better brakes.

I am but I already moved forward with it and just have to get around to bleeding them - the poor car has been sitting there waiting for the brakes to be bled for about a month

quote Originally posted by Golden86: ok, I will have to read it then, I am very interested.

I just read it again last night and reminded myself that the new rear caliper brackets are a big step forward from the conventional Zettner pieces as well. Talk to Kohburn about a pair of those.

yeah I rotated the calipers down 10* and swapped sides so that you can use the stock fiero e-brake cable arangment.. however it was a little too far and I had to trim a corner off the inside brake pad to clear the stock knuckle.. I redrew them to rotate it only 5* for things to clear but it hasn't been tested yet. if anyone wants to try em i can provide the cad files - i'm not interested in making or selling them

I've readed the trend and I'm alittle confused . Is someone selling the caliper brackets and how much and will this work on my 86 ?

No one is selling the re-engineered brackets yet.
My brackets should be available through Street Dreams in a couple of months.
You can download the prints for Kohburn's brackets and have a metal fab shop close to you make them.

As far as component choice goes, the S10 Calipers I discussed in this thread will bolt on in place of the Camaro calipers typically used and retain use of the factory style Fiero brake hoses.

In other words, buy anybody's 11.25" brake kit and substitute S10 calipers for Camaro calipers on the front.

Kohburn are the cad files on page 3 the updated ones ? I printed the frt cad file and it was 109 pages does that sound right ? One more dumb question all I have to do is bring the printed file to a machine shop and they should know what to do according to those #'s ? This looks to be a great alternative for upgrading brakes. Thanks

bump for the awesome info

quote Originally posted by GODFATHER: Kohburn are the cad files on page 3 the updated ones ? I printed the frt cad file and it was 109 pages does that sound right ? One more dumb question all I have to do is bring the printed file to a machine shop and they should know what to do according to those #'s ? This looks to be a great alternative for upgrading brakes. Thanks

No. 109 pages is not correct. What program did you use to print it out? The file should print as a diagram that looks similar to the one further up this page. The files are .dxf, which is a "universal" CAD format used to exchange drawings between different programs. I'm not sure if there's a freeware DXF reader available or not, but you might check www.download.com for one.

Once you get the drawing printed out, you should be able to take it to a metal fab shop and have them flame- or plasma-cut the shape, then take it to a machine shop and have them tap the holes into which the caliper bolts thread. You'll most likely pay more to have a machine shop do the whole thing because they'd have to spend more time cutting the bracket to shape than a fab shop would.

I'm interested, keep up the hard work!

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- Matthew

Black, Wingless '87 GT

yeah you need some sort of CAD viewer program to print them

http://www.viscoustech.com/downloads/rear-adaptor-3.dxf is the updated rear adaptor that hasn't been tested yet
http://www.viscoustech.com/downloads/rear-adaptor-2.dxf is the rear adaptor as I am running it
http://www.viscoustech.com/downloads/front-adaptor.dxf is the front adaptor

http://www.download.com/Free-DWG-Viewer/3000-6677_4-10303573.html?tag=lst-0-3

I haven't tried that program, but it claims to display DXF's.

Thanks Will and Kolburn you guys are very helpful. I tried that site for the download and its only for viewing I can't print anything . I'll keep trying . Thanks

Any other programs that I could use ? I keep trying different things and still can't print the cad pictures . Thanks

maybe a trial version of something like autocad-lite ?

quote Originally posted by GODFATHER: Any other programs that I could use ? I keep trying different things and still can't print the cad pictures . Thanks

Got a fax number? PM or email me.

Will pm sent Thanks

Fax sent. Got it?

Got it . Thanks Will . I'll let you know how they come out .
Thanks again
Joe

I was wondering how much I should be charge for getting the caliper brackets made ? I was also looking on Archies site and he sells the brackets for for his kit for $240 .Are they the same brackets ? The rotor in the picture looks to be a Lebaron vented rotor thats why I was asking .

Are you guys still using the Blazer MC as well??? We installed the Corvette MC when we did the 12" vette brakes on the 86 and we had to have new MC to proportioning block lines made.. I noticed the vette MC was mentioned again earlier in this thread, but I'd like to avoid having to make new lines again...