whats up with the front brakes on this rod???

Yeah, its kinda inevitable...


But there is a lot of misinformation out there.


Maybe somebody should spend some time and a couple of grand, and get some real data ( temps, stopping power, when brake fade sets in, etc ) by doing some measuring on a Hot Rod with both types of systems.

I havent run into the limits of the brakes on my '28.
( nothing special, just a '53 F100 front drum setup)
But I have with my 4 wheel disc braked road track racecar.
Its all about the application, and how you use it...

 

My old trucks with drums don't seem to stop any worse than my 55 with wilwood discs up front. But I also get the 55 going a lot faster, so I kinda like having the disks on it.

 

OK.

Yes I hear ya when you say its not cool to have "fake" stuff on the car, I hear ya.....I feel the same way as well.....besides I wanted to use pre `58 parts on my car mostly in order to achieve the look im going for.

So If I wanted to go for the Buick drum brake setup....what is it that I would need to fit them on my 34???? My 34 has all the stock brake system on it.

Which parts would I need to get to convert into a trick old school drum brake setup??? Are any of those parts like the buick drums available new???

I do have a majour hurdle with my project, and that is that it is forbidden to import used auto parts into PERU. If they catch any used parts at customs they will get confiscated....so its a majour hassle to get used parts, have somebody help me out in the US, have em restored or blasted and painted and looking like new, and then shipping them to me, i have to pay freight and import fees and pray that they go through.

Sometimes I have lost my parts altogether cause I had a customs agent that was a dickhead going thru my parts, only to get them confiscated and paying a fine on top of that.....

I do lots of scrounging and parts hunting locally, and thats how I found my 34 sitting in a field and my 392 hemi buried under a scrap pile in a junkyard,,,,,not easy to come across that kind of stuff in the US,,,,,imagine how hard it is to find stuff like that down here....it takes a lot of scrounging!!!! but I have managed to find quite some cool stuff around here thru the years......

 

I do plan on going fast with the 34 and taking it to the track! The 392 is gonna be NA but Its gonna get BUILT, and its gonna be backed up by a mopar A833 18 spline 4 speed trans.

 

It sounds like a tough decision for you.

One thing to consider...if you are trying to make the car go fast, then keeping it as light as possible helps. Disk brakes add weight. Drum brakes add weight. Having both with the "fakes"...that makes your front brakes twice as heavy as they need to be.

 

if you buy enough completed cars and then remove the parts you need that may be a way around importing used parts .or buy a completed car just like you want ..

 

Fake is fake, and discs are for street rods.

 

I really don't get it. Seems just as bad as LS engines trying to look like hemis or SBC engines trying to look like and Olds??


Posted from the TJJ App for iPhone & iPad

 

www.ace-customs.com Get the originals from here.

 

you need to fix your link there is an extra "e" at the end

 

Wow...

Those are a unique set of problems I didnt even think about.

In that case I'd try to find a set of early calipers off a XK150 Jag and adapt those.

Or wait till Wilson Welding starts selling new Buick Drums.

 

why not just run buick drums on the juice backplates, here's mine:

 

For the guys who dont get it:

I know its not cool to put HEMI valvecovers on SBC, I think that is CRAP as well.

But on these brakes, I mean, I think discs on an old school or traditional hot rod look TOTALLY out of place, specially if they are some kind of current aftermarket piece such as wilwoods.

I would NOT LIKE to have exposed wilwoods on my car which will not be wearing fenders. Face it, hot rods are all about the looks as well.....if not we'd all be building anything else thats more functional and better designed BY FAR. Hondas come to mind....LOL

However, I do appreciate a car that brakes.

Yes I know that having the disc brakes covered by a fake drum will make em build up more heat, its extra unsprung weight (but it wont be that much cause the covers and backing plates are aluminum, not steel or cast iron), etc......still this is a hot rod, Im not trying to compete against a ferrari at laguna seca here.

So if the car can brake good, and have the "right" look to it. I guess it works for me!

Now, putting real Buick drums in there might be the other option as well. I wonder how much is involved in that and how hard is it to find all the parts needed, and which are the parts needed to do such a conversion on my 34!

The one that makes more sense to me, is the one I will opt for.

 

and I printed that entire thread, and put it in my reference binder.

 

Yuppers. But honestly, I am too old to debate with these guys. If he really wants another 1-800 street rod, I'm not gonna try to dissuade him. It just gets old after a while, let 'em go thier own way...

 

Tick...tick...tick.....

 

Sorry, not always. Hurst Airheart stuff is ENTIRELY appropriate on a sixties era period correct hot rod build. And dont forget Kinmonts. But a So-Cal kit with discs inside fake drums? Yea, definate 1-800 street rod.

 

Yeah, thats a definitive advantage about drums on a rod, no real need for a brake booster with drums because of the self energizing and wedging action of the shoes....that means extra space and less clutter.

Like you say, one thing I dont want to build is a 1.800 rod. I agree with that.

So, if thats the case, what do I need on my 34 to have a "real" drum brake setup thats adequate? Like I said, my 34 has all the stock stuff still on it.

What combination of parts would be considered a trick late 50s setup that would compliment the rest of the build with the 392, etc?

 

something like this?

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=730159

 

Nothing more traditional than not being able to stop, when drum brakes get wet on the inside.

 

OK... What I've found out about Drums/Discs...

Not trying to sway you in any direction, just telling you a couple of things I found out.
( warning, I'm going to mention a couple of O/T cars )

The obvious upgrade on a souped up Fiat 600 was a set of Fiat 850 Front discs.
( at the time, it was really easy to double the stock HP number on one of those with maybe $100 worth of junkyard parts and a couple of days of fab work )

I had one of those, but when I sold it the new owner wanted me to put the stock drums back on it.

After that we took it to the track and there happened to be a identically modified 600, but with discs.

The cars were evenly matched in every way, including the braking.

This really surprised me, I did not expect that.
Even more if you realise it would have been better if it also had its stock 12" wheels instead of the 13" upgrade that I had done to get clearence for the 850 Discs it had.


More Hot Rod related, I'm using "53 F100 drums on my '28 and they work great.
( leading shoe is self energising )
I got a freshly rebuilt setup off a streetrodded truck that got a MII IFS, but I think most if not all parts are still available new.

They are a good match for my supercharged SBC powered Hot Rod on skinny Crossply 16" tires.

The nice thing about discs is that you pretty much can fit and forget them.
No adjusting necesary, just keep an eye on the pads and discs every once in a while.

The worst enemy of drums is heat.
I used to have a car that could warp a set of drums in a "spirited" 1/2 hr drive.
( my daily commute was two spirited 1hr drives...)
That car needed discs in the worst kind of way.
But there wasnt anything that would easily bolt on and I didnt have the means or skill to adapt anything yet...



So I'm thinking that a set of F100 Truck Drums like I have on mine would work great on your Hot Rod as well.
Unless you live near to something like the Stelvio pass, and you plan to do balls out runs up and down on it.

 

Domingo, Good to see you over here!
Do some searching here so you can get a better idea what would be a trad brake set-up and a parts list.
Most tend to use the early backing plates for the looks, and you can use the OE non-energizing shoe setup, or at least one guy/shop here does the self-energizing conversion for these backing plates. If you order these, they sure look 'new' which will help with getting them.


You can also go with early 50s F-100 truck brakes as mentioned. Very era correct.
You might even find those down there!


The big bucks and flashy stuff is the Buick drums on ford (or other) backing plates or Kinmont era correct discs.

 

I like the looks of drums over disks, BUT, there have been times that a couple INCHES of less stopping distance was the difference between hitting something and not hitting something. That is the reason I often run disks, wear seatbelts, have wipers, and even carry a fire extinguisher.

I hope I never need any of them, but this isn't a video game, there is no reset button

 

Right...

So the critical part is to have brakes that can be held right at the threshold of locking up for the entire time the car is being slowed down.

Which can be done with some kind of ABS, or better, with a skilled driver and brakes that are balanced right front to rear, and are precise enough to be kept at the threshold of locking up ( without acctually locking up )


The sad fact is that most drivers will just lock everything up and come to a big smokey skidding stop, eventually.

And in that case, what you use to lock up your wheel doesnt make a bit of difference...

 

I have cars with both drum/drum and drum/disk. Both work very well, but I also learned how to drive with a old vehicle that you didn't know if you were going to stop in time. So you learned to plan ahead.

The only thing I can say is make sure you use a dual feed master cylinder with the correct size bore for what ever you decide to use. This way if you happen to blow a rubber line somewhere, or a wheel cylinder, you will at least have something.
Nothings worse than that "pedal went right to the floor" when your coming up on a intersection.

 

I agree. I'm not opposed to discs but well done drum brakes stop just as good in any given situation. I mean if they easily lock up the tires, how much more do you need? Those look cool but it's almost like your ashamed of having discs if you have to hide them.

 

Having a dual feed master cylinder is great if set up properly? The master cyl has to COMPLETELY bottom out with no fluid in it or the safety aspect of the dual master cyl. won't save your ass. Many cars I see do not have enough pedal travel to work correctly. Everyone thinks that a dual master cyl. is the answer, but it has to be correct.


Ago

 

Your correct, I should have added "with the correct pedal travel" to my statement.

 

Actually, the main advantage is a linear relationship between brake pedal force and braking effort. Yeah, they tend to offer better fade resistance - but that's dependent on airflow and when you lock the things up inside a cover that restricts that flow...

The other area where discs are superior is wet braking. When water gets into a drum it stays there, between the shoe and the drum. Discs throw off water.

Now, back to the first point. Once upon a time, you had some pretty linear drum designs - Chrysler's two-trailing-shoe design, and to some extent the Huck setup on Chevys and fixed-anchor designs where only the leading shoe could 'wrap' into the drum.

But in those days 'power assist' was a bowl of Wheaties so over time auto makers gravitated toward 'floating anchor' brake designs (Bendix) that used the friction of the leading shoe on the drum to 'assist' the braking by 'wrapping up' both leading and trailing shoes.

The problem with this is that it makes braking response non-linear - you push a little and you get a little brake, you push a little more and you get a LOT more brake. Much more susceptible to lockup and more difficult to modulate through the pedal.

Maybe this was a necessary tradeoff when trying to stop a 4200lb+ car with nothing save a foot, but with the widespread adoption of power assist the Bendix self-servoing brake design became something like the human appendix - maybe it had some use at some point in the past evolution of the species, but that time had long passed, now it was at best useless and at worst quite harmful.

 

I agree with that last part. I have a friend who works on nothing but Model As and his 31 coupe will lock up all 4 in a heart beat.

I suppose we have all had those situations where inches matter but if it gets down to that, you are probably either over-driving the conditions or your situational awareness isn't what it should be. I suggest riding a panhead with stock brakes for a couple years, then you will learn to pay attention to everyone and everything, probably never get in another scrape, even with mediocre brakes.
BTW, the best brakes I ever had were drums. On a 57 F350 dually I drove the crap out of. It had a hydrovac behind the seat, single master cylinder and it would face plant you with very light pedal pressure. BUT I had the shoes relined, drums turned and the shoes arced in at a truck brake shop. They also used Velvetouch linings.