E30 Race Brakes Install

[Damo 23]

Hi all,

While most are arguing about who has the fastest BMW and whether its jap powered or not, some of us wander out into the garage and start making them

I should be adding this to the M30 turbo rebuild page, but it just worked SO well that I thought I should share it.

YOU WILL NEED:

1.25" rotor capable Wilwood Superlite / SLII/ SLIIR calipers

2x 20mm pad spacers (for the inside pad)

optional: 1.25"x12" rotors and adaptors (I started with these, but the way it all worked I have not yet used them!)

Tap for caliper bolts (M12x1.5 I think?)

Adapter for Wilwood brake line fitting thread to BMW brake line fitting thread (from a hydraulics shop)

Wheels with a huge (positive?) offset or 25mm spacers as I used.

Wheel bolts that dont protrude out of your spacers (or swap to studs) if used.

INSTALL:

1. By the grace of the BMW gods, Girling and Wilwood have used the SAME mounting pattern for their calipers. This means you dont need a caliper adapter bracket, which is usually the hardest part of the process!!!!

2. Tap the bolt holes on the Wilwood calipers - the holes are already drilled out to the right size to accept the tap.

3. With the work done on the calipers, remove all the factory gear, including the rotor. I am assuming your factory rotors are the same vented ones as I have; I had them slotted and cross-drilled when I did my engine conversion.

here is where I considered using the rotor adapters; If the factory ones have any issues in testing I will make a simple adapter bracket (to push the caliper out further to make room for the larger rotors. This will also require longer wheel bolts as the adaptor is thicker than the factory rotors to give the Wilwood rotors the correct offset.

Assuming you are carrying on using factory rotors:

4. Put the factory caliper bolts back in, but in REVERSE; so the head is on the rotor side.

5. put the rotor back in place on the hub and put the locating screw in a few threads, but so you can still put an angle on the rotor.

6. Bolt the caliper onto the hub; you wil need to ben some of the heatshield and put the rotor on an angle as you do the bolts up so you can reach the heads. Tighten up the caliper bolts and now the rotor locating cap screw and check it all turns freely.

7. ADMIRE your massive brakes for a while before you complete the install. You will notice you have more gap on one side than the other between the rotor and the pistons. This isnt 110% ideal but with the pad spacers on one side it makes no functional difference.

8. put in the pads and pad spacer on the inside - the AWESOME part is that the pads are replaceable without removal of the caliper, just a couple of runner bolts and a cotter pin.

9. Install the brake lines and bleed the system as per normal brakes

10. Reinstall the wheels. To do this I had to use some 25mm spacers; these are the type that have new studs in them so they have the advantage of converting you to studs and they are totally certifiable.

ADVANTAGES:

4 piston calipers

2.5G braking potential

Replace pads without removing more than the wheel

2.5G braking potential!!!!!!!!!!

Lighter than factory - less unsprung weight

Better heat dissipation, VASTLY less potential for brake fade!

I can get these calipers for about $400 a pair used if anyone wants to do this

Pictures soon, I am going back into the garage for now

[Damo 23]

OK some pictures I took while I was doing a trial fitment, shows you the end product essentially:

[Damo 23]

More:

[Damo 23]

more again

[Damo 23]

next

[Damo 23]

the intended rotrs and adaptors:

[conrod 1]

Damo, things were looking okay until I saw the bit about the brake pad spacer- sorry pal but that is far less than 110% ideal! I very much doubt that the caliper was designed to run with the pad that deep in the body, and it must be close if not at the end of the pad guides, it certainly appears so from the pictures you posted. As well as that, the choice of material for the spacer would be interesting, as it would act as a bit of a heat sink and will make one side run hotter than the other, not to mention the risk of the spacer jamming in the caliper reducing braking efficiency. You may get away with it, but I sure wouldn't be recommending anyone else trying this at home! :thumbsdown:

Edited June 4, 2006 by conrod

[Guest Andrew]

Cool - was looking at doing brakes this way.

Conrad: What would you change to make it work with this setup?

[conrod 1]

Cool - was looking at doing brakes this way.

Conrad: What would you change to make it work with this setup?

The brake calipers were obviously made for a much larger rotor, there is a serious mismatch in parts used here. Use larger rotors to suit, or smaller calipers that match the rotor size properly.

Sorry Damo, I am not trying to rain on your party, I really like the projects you are working on at the moment, an M30 turbo is a serious bit of gear, and the 2002 Touring looks cool too, certainly a bit outside the square which I always like!

But I think you could get yourself into trouble with this brake setup so thought I would express my concerns. Anyway, enough from me, time to wander back out in the garage and do some work on mine.......

Edited June 4, 2006 by conrod

[Gus 5]

they are smaller rotors...is he not using the ones in the bottom pic? the mounted ones are stock rotors drilled and slotted

[Damo 23]

Cool - was looking at doing brakes this way.

Conrad: What would you change to make it work with this setup?

The brake calipers were obviously made for a much larger rotor, there is a serious mismatch in parts used here. Use larger rotors to suit, or smaller calipers that match the rotor size properly.

Sorry Damo, I am not trying to rain on your party, I really like the projects you are working on at the moment, an M30 turbo is a serious bit of gear, and the 2002 Touring looks cool too, certainly a bit outside the square which I always like!

But I think you could get yourself into trouble with this brake setup so thought I would express my concerns. Anyway, enough from me, time to wander back out in the garage and do some work on mine.......

I completely agree with you that it is not ideal BUT I would not have even considered the pad spacer if I had not seen it used on other vehicles with the same brakes.

One side will not get any hotter than the other with an Ali spacer, and the pads run along the top of the caliper as a guide so have nowhere to fall out. I intended to use the larger rotors originally, and may still do so if the factory rotors cant cut it.

It is essential to use a pad spacer to ensure even extension on both pairs of pistons, and it is no different in caliper function than shimming the caliper at the mounts. This cannot be done due to the factory mount point position.

I will let you know how they go and if there are any amendments to the design.

[Damo 23]

Damo, things were looking okay until I saw the bit about the brake pad spacer- sorry pal but that is far less than 110% ideal! I very much doubt that the caliper was designed to run with the pad that deep in the body, and it must be close if not at the end of the pad guides, it certainly appears so from the pictures you posted. As well as that, the choice of material for the spacer would be interesting, as it would act as a bit of a heat sink and will make one side run hotter than the other, not to mention the risk of the spacer jamming in the caliper reducing braking efficiency. You may get away with it, but I sure wouldn't be recommending anyone else trying this at home! :thumbsdown:

Sorry I should mention that the spacer bolts to the pad - there are holes in the backing plates of the wilwood pads to accomodate this. So you have no risk of falling out.

As far as the spacer binding, how would that happen? I cant see it being any more prone to it than the pad by itself, infact I think it would move more smoothly given that the wider area against the guide bolts has less opportunity to move at an angle to the caliper and create a jamming effect.

Any other possible problems it could cause? Im all ears because it will take me just as long to machine up the spacer as it would to make a spacer bracket to fit the bigger rotors. I just dont see the need to waste the new factory rotors when I still utilise the full pad area up against them?

[conrod 1]

As an alternative, why not split the caliper, and mill 10mm off each half? That is of course if the caliper design allows this, I have seen it done on AP's for the same reason.

[Damo 23]

As an alternative, why not split the caliper, and mill 10mm off each half? That is of course if the caliper design allows this, I have seen it done on AP's for the same reason.

Funny, thats the conclusion I have come to as I did the other side - I have several different pairs of the calipers, and some versions just use hollow metal rods inbetween the caliper sides to create the gap. Cut them down and presto - smaller caliper

Cheers!

i will post some more pics of the updated install

[SRBMW 6]

Hey Damo Something I think you should think about.

Wilwood calipers run a max pressure psi of 1200psi they are designed to be used with unboosted master cylinders(people that sell these calipers don't tell you this)most boosted systems run alot higher pressure,chuck some gauges on and you'll find out.

I've got dynalites on the front of mine and have the template for the adaptor if you want to use it.

Is tapping into Alluminium ok for the mounting bolts?The alloy nissan calipers i have sitting here have a knurled steel insert that is used to accept the mounting bolt.

cheers

Darren

[Damo 23]

Hey Damo Something I think you should think about.

Wilwood calipers run a max pressure psi of 1200psi they are designed to be used with unboosted master cylinders(people that sell these calipers don't tell you this)most boosted systems run alot higher pressure,chuck some gauges on and you'll find out.

I've got dynalites on the front of mine and have the template for the adaptor if you want to use it.

Is tapping into Alluminium ok for the mounting bolts?The alloy nissan calipers i have sitting here have a knurled steel insert that is used to accept the mounting bolt.

cheers

Darren

Darren - as I mentioned in a post further up, I am using a tilton dual master cylinder setup & pedal because the factory booster setup got in the way of the turbo piping.

The Dynalites run a very different bolt spacing; I have a set of dynalites to run on the back of the 2002 (has drums at the moment!)

Cheers for the info!

[SRBMW 6]

Thats good to hear Damo I just didn't see it in this post so assumed you were running a bmw boosted cylinder as you had adaptors for the bmw lines.

Let me know how this thing brakes and what types of pads you end up using,cheers

Darren

Edited June 5, 2006 by SRBMW