Stock 68 4 piston caliper

[CravinMoreSpeed]

I have a 68 camaro with the origional 4 piston front calipers and one of them is leaking. My question is will it be worth it to replace the fronts with stainless steel sleved calipers from Classic Industries for about 170 each, or upgrade to a baer kit. Money is tight and this car will be a weekend driver with no track time, but will have lowered suspension and about 400 hp. Will the stocks be fine or will i just want to upgrade them later. Any info is greatly appreciated.
Travis

[Happyfunballs]

I had a set of newly sleeved calipers ready for my 67. I decided to sell them and go with the Baer set-up.

[chicane67]

I had run the four piston units for years and loved them...... if you get the right pad in the caliper, balance the distribution and lay into them hard enough, they will drag 60 to 0 in under 125 feet. Thats right near some of the BAER units, and bettering some of them, in braking power.

The only problem I had never liked was the aggressive pad taper.

I used Andy Porterfields (http://www.porterfield-brakes.com/) "R4-S" compound pads and his semi-met rear drum shoes. From that point, I reversed the rear drum shoes to change the bias and used a 1978 'WS6' power master cylinder ~ but used it in a manual brake set-up. The chassis stopped like no other........

I had never had my calipers rebuilt, but I have done quite a few of my clients chassis and have always used Stainless Steel Brakes re placement calipers. Over the years, I have used a few different suppliers and some with not so good results. SSB has, what I feel is, a better product and excellent customer service....if you ever have a problem, hands down.

Is the change worth it ?? Well considering that you can put together your own front and rear kit for a fraction of the cost, the parts availibility for the rest of the cars life, options and braking power...... its might be something that you might want to seriously consider. If you dont want the issues of hunting down the right pile of parts, the BAER kits are COMPLETE, no questions asked (and the most complete I might add). The added expense may be well worth it on your behalf. If not, you can build your own kit and the knowledge of how to do that, is right here on this site.

But if the expense is a concern, Ill tell you, if you get a good rebuilt caliper and put the right pads in them, the stock four pistons will amaze you in their ability. The reasons I changed from the stock D3 calipers was the parts availibility and the options. If it wasnt for that I would still run the D3's, handsdown.

But, I feel that you will most likely want to upgrade in the future...... that idea never fails. My 67 chassis went from the 11" D3's, to 13" PBR's and now its onto 14" sixpiston AP's. But then again, I dig negitive G's more than horsepower........

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[CravinMoreSpeed]

Well i guess ill run the stocks for now with some more agressive pads. Do you know where to get slotted rotors for these calipers, if they even exist? Thanks for your replys.

Travis

[chicane67]

I have seen them, but it has been a few years. I know the rotors that Classic Industries now sells, is the same replacement rotor that I used when they first became available in 1993. I really dont think that you will need slotted rotors, there is no realy advantage to them with the pads you are considering for your D3's.

I should point out to you that you will want to check out what Touring Classics has to offer. His kits utilize the newer C5/C6 PBR caliper for roughly HALF the price of BAER.

Take a look....... (http://www.touring-classics.com/index.htm)

[Rick Dorion]

Tom, what rims/tires are you using with the new setup?

[chicane67]

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Wrapped in either Kumho ECSTA's or BFG KDW's.

[mrgto]

Take em off and sell them to a restorer. Those are fairly rare calipers on a F-body or a A-body. And they are heavy, so if you go aftermarket, you'll save some weight up front.