Just made custom brackets for a wilwood kit
 

For my FD and it wasnt too hard at all.

All I did was use 3/8" plexiglass and I just dremeled it until it fit like I wanted. Took about an hour to make the bracket after I had everything off.

Tomorrow I am taking the plexiglass template to a shop and have it made with 3/8" steel.

Just thought I would drop a note to encourage others who may be in the same situation as I was (no brackets) to give it a whirl themselves!

Shawn

mods

Which wilwood calipers, and which rotors?

Did I dyno with you in kannapolis last year with Brian?You ended up blowing oil smoke out your exhuast or sumthin like that?

Superlite 4 piston calipers with 12.7" x 1.25" drilled rotors.

Shawn

Yep that was me and it was about a quart of oil out of my blow off valve and several dozen clouds of smoke.... You had a red T78 right?

Shawn

mods

how much for the wilwood kit?

I bought it used on the forum for $375! :)

Brackets cost me $50 to have made so I have $425 into them. They came with stainless lines which I already had so I sold them for $25. Then I sold my stock calipers for $60 and I have a pending sale of my stock rotors for $50 so if that goes through my total cost for the upgrade will be $290.

Jealous? :)

Shawn

Yep. Nothing wrong with bargain shopping :cool:

Can you post a pic of your finished brackets? I would like to seem them.

Thanks

Job well done Shawn. Please post pics. Also, have the machine shop save the macining info for you. Then you can have more made for your friends. OK, friend? :)

Chris

The bracket configuration will vary on the rotor and caliper sizes. No one size fits all opportunity here - and if the caliper is much wider than the ones I got I could see the bracket becoming much more complicated. The diameter of the rotor, the thickness of the rotor and the width of the caliper and its mounting arms all come into play here which is why I would recommend anyone else doing this follow the same steps as I did. Take all the stock stuff off, put the new rotor on and approximate caliper position, cut rough bracket and drill holes for stock mounting spots, then mount bracket to car and then finally hold the caliper up to bracket in correct position and mark the final 2 holes. Then it was just a matter of fine tuning the bracket and taking it to a shop. I just went to a local metal repair shop and they did it the same day for me.

I will snap a pic or 2 tonight - they are going on tomorrow morning. :)

Shawn

I could have cut them down a bit more but I figured I would rather over engineer it than under engineer it.

Can you believe precision brake company was going to charge me $300 for these and they would not be returnable and they wouldnt gaurantee they would work. yea right like anyone would buy those....

The fronts are alot simpler than the backs that I have seen.

I will take some pics of the install tomorrow.

http://www.3rdgenrx7.com/images/wilwoodbrackets.jpg

Thats awesome man..... great job with the whole car

Thanks! Just a few more months and I will have the car finished (yea right like I wont find something else to do on it...). I have about 500 hours into it now - kinda crazy to think about it but I suppose it keeps me out of trouble - at least until I get it on VIR.

The 2 things I am most proud about this project are:

1) I never did any work on a car before this one. (and since starting my car I have pulled a friends 3rdgen engine also).

2) I have about 21K into the project total. I feel like I have gotten alot done with a little money. Paint and rims are the last 2 major things on the immediate list and that should put me up to a little over 24K when it is all said and done.

No way I could afford to have the work done by someone else and the project has also given me a great knowledge of my car. Only 2 things that are still a mystery to me - Ignition timing and suspension system. I have read some stuff about ignition timing but it still seems like voodoo to me. And I have got the koni coilovers but as far as the rest of the suspension I dont know much about the system.

I checked out your site and it looks like you have some projects going yourself. I had a first gen before this car and basically gave it away an am now wishing I didnt. Your car looks great!

Shawn

How do you like your Wilwoods ? Is the brake balance the same as stock, or little off ? If off, is it biased to the rear, or the front ?

How did your brakes perform at VIR ?

Thanks,
:-) neil

I am very happy with the brakes though I havent put them to the test of the track yet. Sad to say but I never made an event this year - ended up moving across the state. I am tenatively scheduled to be at VIR in a couple weeks so we will see then hopefully.

I switched to a street pad this year (instead of the racing pads that came with the kit) and I cant say a bad thing about the setup for the street.

Have you had a chance to see how they perform on the track ?

Who made the custom rotor hats for you ?

TIA,
:-) neil

^ sweet i love when people bring back threads! yeah lets get an update here :)

I took the car to a HPDE at Rockingham and didnt even change the pads to the track pads. Street Pads had plenty of stop and never gave me any reason to even think about my brakes. It had some hard breaking zones including a 130 to 40 at turn 1 into the road course.

The only thing I can slightly complain about is that the pads rattle when I am on a "cobblestone" like street and on speed bumps. It hasnt annoyed me enough to try and do something about it though. :)

As far as the hats go - the rotors, hats, calipers, race pads, and stainless lines all came from another forum member. He sold his rx7 and I havent seen him on in forever so I cant help you there.

So where are the pics ?

Will they clear 16-inch stock wheels ?

:-) neil