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why do stock brakes suck?


brian89gp

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I nearly rear ended someone for the, hell I've lost count, time today. Both the boat of a car next to me and the pickup behind stopped a good 15' shorter while I came within inches of the rear end of the car in front of me.

 

Somethings got to be the cause of this, other cars, larger cars have the same sized rotors so it can't be that. Is it an underpowered brake booster or ill-designed calipers? I'm really sick of this, the car is virtually a rolling death trap.

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The pre-'94 cars have small brake boosters and crappy rear brakes.

 

My '94 isn't great in the braking department as i have gotten them hot enough to make the hot brakes smell already.

 

The rotors are kind of smallish...10.5" isn't too great on a 3400# car.

 

You need carbon metallic front pads as a must and you should also check the inboard side of your rotors to make sure it is using all the surface area...if it is not, turn them or replace them. I will be doing this soon.

 

I would love to put the 2nd gen front brakes on but I don't think it would be very easy.

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Its a 94 GTP, I've had both the larger 94 booster and now the smaller 88-93 booster on it and noticed little difference between them. I've had PF pads, generic cheepo pads, and some other mid quality pad. The PF pads were great for 5k but then they started glazing over extremely easily, the other 2 brands are pretty bad. I can lock them on pavement but its got to be at 10mph or slower and i have to use the steering wheel for leverage.

 

My old 89 had the same issues and I never was able to fix it either.

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I think its because the brakes are undersized and the car is oversized...... :? :x

 

What wheels do you have on? With my 16s (on the Beretta....PF pads and AutoZone rotors) and there more open face, I notice less fade and heat soak....due to, what I think, is the fact that air is more readily avalible to cool the rotors.

 

What options are there for big brakes?

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you can get the knuckle assembly out of a gen 2 gp, they have 11.25 rotors...

 

I can lock my tires at any speed, wet, dry, whereever in between, I use the stock everything, and cheepo pads...maybe I have a wednesday car. they do get hot though. real hot. smelly hot. sexy hot.

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Curtis seems to think its the line pressure. I would guess line pressure might help but more pad surface owns. the 94 rears alone had the cutlass braking much better than the old setup. You could check your brake booster check valve, maybe its gone bad?

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you can get the knuckle assembly out of a gen 2 gp, they have 11.25 rotors...

 

My car has 11.25s in the front.. I think his would too since it's a GTP.

 

Only REALY late year 95 models and up got the 11.25" fronts.

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I've found that the brakes (stock) work much better with fresh fluid.

 

I know what you guys mean about small brakes. The first time I took of the rear wheels, I actually started to laugh out loud.

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I hate to say it, but it's more of a problem from a small master cylinder than anything. My '87 Monte has the older style huge GM cylinder, and a small booster, it stops on a dime and can lock em up whenever and wherever.

 

Brake boosters, larger brakes etc etc may slightly improve it, but the bottom line is it doesnt provide more line pressure.

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you can IMPROVE your breaking distance and time and break life by simply sliding the floor shifter to "N" when you try to stop. believe me the car has NO problem stoping from 100mph to 0 in nuetral

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do you see how little room we have in that area? you'll also have to fabricate new brake lines since the old ones will probably not line up. I'm not going to bother since my '95 has good brakes and I've stopped short no problem, but the project is up for grabs :P

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You could aways switch to the PM3 Brian. lol

 

Hey, my Trofeo had PM3 and aside from the stupid $1200 repair I had to do the brakes worked great (stupid leaky accumulator ball). Then again, that car had 11" up front and and 11 1/16" in the rear so...

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Im not sure if its possible, but i emailed a company on this topic yesterday. I saw the company somewhere on this weekends Trucks episode on SpikeTV. They deal with electronically controlled Master cylinders. Like i said, i emailed them, if anyone else would like to email them also please do so. Im also wondering whats the real difference between master cylinders say for example a Camaro as opposed to ours. Here is the website:

 

http://www.abspowerbrake.com

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Now there is an idea. Probably be able to remove the booster, screw on a mounting plate to the firewall plate, then bolt that on.

 

Anybody know or have a way to measure stock line pressure?

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