brake rules question for 88 f-body.

[Glenn]

does this rule-

 

8.35.10 "Late model GM cars may use the factory stock front and rear rotor and caliper assemblies from 1998 - 2002 GM Camaro, Firebird or TransAms."

-prevent me from using the above mentioned brakes on my 88 Formula that i'm building for the 05 season?

the way i read the rule is this would be a legal upgrade for 93-97 F-bodies, but not 82-92. or does "late model GM cars" refere to 82-97?

i see no reason to allow 93-97 cars to upgrade to something that the 82-92 cars cant upgrade to, so this rule confuse's me somewhat w/ the term "late model".

[Al F.]

The interpretation was that "late model" referred to 4th gen cars. So, yep, the early 4th gens could upgrade to something the 3rd gens couldn't. Similarly, 3rd gens have sway bar options that (even though they'd work) 4th gens arent allowed to use.

 

Several of the brake rules are being re-written for 05 to be a little clearer and to keep up with modern times. Hopefully the other directors wont jump me for letting the cat out of the bag, but the expectation is to allow 3rd gens to use 4th gen rears at the minimum.

[Glenn]

so any sugestions to a dual piston front upgrade thats not gonna cost me over $1K? the LS1 F-body brakes could be done front and rear on a 3rd gen @ that price.

this seems to be the last major hurdle i need to overcome prior to taking a wrench to the 88 i have and need to start.

[Kevin Hall]

Glenn,

Spohn has a 1LE kit for the fronts that runs about 850. If you don't have access to some of the parts like I did, it is a good price. We just did the upgrade to our '83, and boy, was it nice not to get totally out braked this time around. The hardest part was trusting the car after the problems we had with the stock fronts the first race.

 

We did the modifcations ourselves, and it only took a saturday for both sides. I recommend buying a regular tap and a bottoming tap for when you modify the dust shield holes, it makes it much easier. Use plenty of oil when cutting the threads, too. To cut the steering knuckle to fit the new brackets, we used a reciprocating saw with a new blade, it cut the original steering knuckles with no problem, and it was a lot easier that we thought it would be.

 

Spohn has a pretty good website, http://www.spohn.net/, I ended up calling them as we needed a couple of other things in addition to the caliper carriers and the 1LE brackets. Be sure to get the CD too, it's worth the 30 bucks (and I'm notoriously cheap). I had it in my laptop in the garage as we were doing the work for easy reference. The CD also gives some advice on converting to rear disk brakes.

 

Kevin Hall

#82 Camaro

[Al F.]

dust shields?? What are dust shields doing on a race car?

[bsim]

Al, what do you think they're for - to keep dust off the wheels. Duh!

 

Actually, the dust shield mounting holes become the mounting holes for the new calipers. Unfortunately, I didn't have the testicular fortitude to trust ME in getting the holes done right. So I had to get one's already done...

[Kevin Hall]

Since I can't seem to stay on the track, I thought the dust shields would be a good idea? I guess not having a wall to keep me honest makes off track excursions too enticing. That and letting the 18 year old drive in HPDE 3, so he could spin during his last lap. The really annoying part is he turned a faster lap in HPDE 3, than I did in the race! Kids these days.

 

Naw, Brad's right, they get sacrificed to carry the caliper brackets. I understand being nervous about doing the modifcations, but my WALLET didn't have the fortitude not to give it a shot. Heck, spindles aren't that expensive, so I figured I could mess one up and get another at a junk yard if needed.