For today’s hot rodders, better braking performance alone isn’t enough. Brakes have to look right and work right. Brakes are expected to look cool, stay cool and bring all that high-dollar horsepower safely to a stop.

Fortunately for us all, today’s automakers recognize braking as integral to overall performance and today’s aftermarket is ready and eager to supply powerful upgrades for yesterday’s cars and today’s.

Even if the brakes on an older car are in very good condition, they won’t match the safety and performance of even the most-basic modern system.

“Early vehicle brakes were generally very poor so they will need a lot of work, depending on the weight and the power of the vehicle,” said Fred Anderson, president of BrakeQuip in Knoxville, Tennessee.

When rodders began to integrate larger wheels, powerful engines and more sophisticated suspension systems into their vehicles, they also had to make changes to the brake system.

“Brakes needed to be bigger and more responsive, and to look good, too,” said Mike Jonas, president of Stainless Steel Brakes Corp. (SSBC) in Clarence, New York. “Style, form and fitment are critical when deciding on brakes. Race-style brakes are not always appealing, but lighter-weight street brakes (still a bit bigger than stock) can be stylized with color added to them.”

Kristen Hill of Classic Performance Products (CPP) in Anaheim, California, noted that those in the pro-touring scene seem to be especially aware of the capabilities of their vehicles. She cited education as the single greatest advance in braking systems with more people understanding how to build a system correctly.

“Brake systems are pretty basic when you get down to the nuts and bolts,” she said. “It gets complicated when you want to put together a system that will out-perform someone else’s.” 

Choosing a System

A brake system’s performance is serious business, but in today’s market, style has become major selling point as well.

“In applications where the brakes will be visible, customers do value aesthetics,” said Hill. “This is not to say that they would sacrifice performance for aesthetics, but it is important to them that their ride look good and perform well. If it doesn’t look sexy as heck, you’re not going to put it on a $100,000 show-stopper.

“Occasionally you will find a customer whose vision is all about aesthetics, then it’s good to know what their vision is,” she continued. “The first step in selecting brakes for a particular build is knowing what size wheel the vehicle will have and knowing the customer’s goals for the project. When you listen to your customers’ wants and needs, you can ultimately provide them with a system that will look good, perform great and fit their application.”

Muscle car enthusiasts, in particular, know exactly how they want their brakes to look, said Rick Elam of Baer Brake Systems Inc. in Phoenix.

“Since new wheel designs are open, customers want to see that big, sophisticated-looking brake behind the wheel as much as they want that brake to perform, and bigger brakes do go hand-in-hand with better performance,” he said. “We talk to many people who know exactly what they want cosmetically but who are less sure which brakes will meet their performance goals.

“Normally, we ask what the car will weigh, what the customer is planning to use for an apply system, the goal of the build and the size of the wheels,” said Elam.

“Our experience indicates that aesthetics are critical for customers who buy our larger street kits,” said Ken Hale of Wilwood Engineering in Camarillo, California. He added that roughly one-third of all Wilwood large-diameter brake kits are ordered with red calipers.

Don’t make the mistake, however, of installing racing brakes on a street car.

“Street parts must be D.O.T.-compliant,” Jonas of SSBC noted. “[This means that] they must have dust boots and stand up to some very rigorous testing. We do that here. Every SSBC caliper is tested to three times the normal operating pressure, and all of our street calipers follow D.O.T. guidelines, which are there for your safety.

 “Know what the customer is going to do with the car,” Jonas emphasized. “Many smaller brakes are designed for specific reasons. Larger brakes have more flexibility, but require specific fitments and certain wheels.” 

Wheels, once again, should be the deciding factor when choosing a caliper, said Jonas, adding that many big brake kits won’t fit billet wheels or most cast wheels.

“Consider, for example, a cast, five-spoke, 17-inch wheel,” he said. “Because the manufacturer has to add additional material for strength, caliper clearance is compromised. SSBC makes specific kits to handle that problem and eliminate wheel issues. Many shorter spindles have issues with big brakes due to the control arms being so close.

“The critical information you need [to know is the] weight of the vehicle, style of driving (street, autocross, drag racing, etc.), size of the wheels and type of suspension,” he said. “This is where you start choosing your system, because the brakes are an active part of the suspension. Build your parts on paper, ask the manufacturer lots of questions and make sure all the parts work together.”

Undercover Motion Stoppers

At the opposite extreme is the customer who’s either building a car where the brakes can’t easily be seen or he doesn’t care if they are. Even so, “disc brakes function better than drum brakes,” said Hill of CPP.

“Even a customer who is running small, steel wheels can benefit from a disc-brake conversion,” she said.

 “A lot of people like the flashy stuff,” said Ralph Lisena of Engineered Components Inc. (ECI) in Vernon, Connecticut. “But a lot of others just want something that fits and works. We make the stuff that fits and works.

 “The vast majority of our products are based on the GM big-piston caliper,” Lisena continued. “It’s a well-made, reliable unit, easy to find and reasonably priced. We match them to a variety of rotors from GM, Ford and Chrysler. We don’t mess around with exotic hardware. [We prefer equipment that] you can fix by the side of the road.”

Kits to fit Mustang II front-end conversions are especially popular, but ECI also makes kits to fit the stock spindles on Fords and Mopars back to 1937, and on Chevrolets back to 1928. Kits for classic Mustangs, popular GM muscle cars and selected pickups are also available.  

“We’ve been adding kits here and there,” Lisena said. “We listen to what people ask for. If enough people ask for a disc brake kit for, say, a 1934 Reo, then maybe we should look at that. There are a lot of cars being built today that people wouldn’t have even considered building 10 years ago.”

New Braking Innovations

For all the sophistication of modern brakes, advances  in  manufacturing “are still bringing grand new ideas to the market and at a reasonable price point,” said Elam of Baer. “We’re building parts better, quicker and with more innovation than we ever could before.

“For example, we’re now making forged mono-block calipers and we recently introduced our Baer Tracker full-floater rear,” Elam said. “These are pieces that are very detailed and used to be difficult to machine.”

Wilwood, meanwhile, has released two new rotor materials, including the Spec 37, a proprietary iron alloy designed to handle the tremendous heat of a racing environment, yet suitable for street use as well. The Spec 37 is going into all of the company’s high-performance street kits that use iron rotors, Hale said.

For even more demanding applications—and for customers willing to spend the extra cash—Wilwood also offers Carbon Ceramic rotors, much like the ones that now come standard on many exotic sports cars.

“They are about one-third the weight of iron so that reduces your unsprung weight,” Hale said. “And they wear significantly longer than iron as well.”

SSBC has developed its new V8 Caliper, a lightweight, eight-piston caliper featuring directional rotors for cooling and high-performance Hawk brake pads. Best of all, it fits inside a 15-inch wheel, making it ideal for building a sleeper,  according to Jonas.

Selecting Components

Regardless of what kind of system you’re building, Anderson of BrakeQuip stressed the importance of getting the right components. He advised novice brake system builders to get professional advice from a brake specialist before buying components.

“This may save you from having to do the job more than once because, say, you put in a master cylinder with the wrong bore or an incorrect proportioning valve,” he said.

“Most people really don’t understand the physics that go into designing a brake system,” Hale of Wilwood said. “Picking the wrong master cylinder is one of the most common mistakes but it is only one of several. So, again, consult a professional when considering a brake upgrade.” 

Hill of CPP added that the number of pistons in a caliper doesn’t determine the performance of a braking system.  Clamping force is a function of total piston area and “some multiple-piston calipers don’t have as much total area as some large, single-piston units,” she said.

The experts also stressed that a builder should always update old-style single-circuit systems to a dual-circuit configuration.

“Dual braking systems were introduced in the early 1960s [and made mandatory in 1967] for safety reasons,” said Anderson. “Any vehicle that has a single master cylinder needs to upgrade to a dual system.”

And while you’re running that new plumbing, consider using hard line and plain rubber hoses, Anderson suggested.

“Unless you can actually see your brake lines and want to show them off, we recommend rubber rather than braided stainless,” he said.

“Rubber lasts longer and is more reliable,” Anderson said. “The two main reasons people choose braided brake lines are a firmer pedal feel and flashier appearance. If you can’t see them, who cares what they look like?”

He cautioned builders to use only OEM hoses made in the United States.

“[This hose] expands very little under pressure, so the difference in feel versus braided stainless is not that significant,” Anderson said. 

OEM systems are designed to minimize the length of any flexible hose and to maximize the length of rigid metal tubing, which, unlike any kind of hose, has zero expansion, Anderson said.

Builders shouldn’t skimp on price.

“Many low-cost brakes do not come complete, or use low-grade products such as Chinese bearings, low-performance pads or lightweight rotors,” said Jonas of SSBC. “You may save a few dollars initially, but down the road you’re going to spend more. Low-buck pads usually can’t handle high heat and they cause the rotors to glaze.

“Non-plated calipers will eventually seize, damaging not only themselves but the rotors and pads,” he said. And because of the inevitable corrosion, “unplated parts look like hell after a few seasons,” he added.

Similarly, the most-common mistake Hill of CPP sees is a builder trying to piece-meal together a system on a budget.

“You wind up with a hodgepodge of parts that, at best, were not meant to work together and at worst conflict with each other,” she said. “We offer budget systems, so if you don’t want to spend a lot of money we can at least sell you a system that will work with your application.”

Trail Braking

“Treat it as a system, not something where you buy a piece from this guy and a piece from that guy and a piece from the junkyard and one from a swap meet, and you slap it on the car because you like the look of it,” said Lisena of ECI. “Nine times out of 10, it won’t work the way you want it to.”

“Anybody can build a bracket to adapt a caliper to a spindle, but you need to think of the big picture and see how all these pieces are going to work together,” said Elam of Baer. “You can put the biggest brakes available on a spindle, but if everything else is not correct, the car will not stop.

“The most-common mistake we see is in not looking at the big picture and making sure all the parts you want to use will work together correctly,” he said.

And check clearances, not only for the wheels but the brakes themselves.

“Don’t jump the gun and start buying parts,” Elam said. “Think the project through and buy the right parts for your car and your budget. Just do your homework. We’re here to help and to answer any questions.”

Tags: Baer Brakes, Brake Systems, BrakeQuip, Brakes, Classic Performance Products, CPP, Engineered Components, SSBC, Wilwood