How-to: Cheap brake upgrade

[cj10jeeper]

I might be interested in those cj if you do sell them drop me a PM

Sure, but don't be sat on the edge of your seat waiting. I have yet to think about rotors and pads, although certain to be EBS green stuff, but I do fancy some drilled rotors given the open structure of 108's.

wonder if Brembo do a front and matching rear?

EDIT
Zeta Tre I did a little resarch and while the carrier is unique to the 330 and Z4 3.0Si the caliper is common to the E83 X3 too. Might just help as the 330 calipers seem to be grabbed pretty quick.

[ElegantSpoon]

Not a problem

I'm in no rush and pretty skint after christmas.

[ZetaTre]

wonder if Brembo do a front and matching rear?

I'm a Brembo slotted fan after trying them. Reason is, I noticed they stop a lot quicker when wet as I guess they let the vapor escape faster. Solid were pretty scary as the first 5 seconds I had no brakes at all... That's on the Z3. I think the Z4 has that brakes drying technology... Not sure...

Tirerack has them for the 330i package...

Zeta Tre I did a little resarch and while the carrier is unique to the 330 and Z4 3.0Si the caliper is common to the E83 X3 too. Might just help as the 330 calipers seem to be grabbed pretty quick.

Thanks for pointing that out. I actually left them out intentionally because the swap would be more complicated as it requires source calipers and carriers from different sources, but I add a note...

[ZetaTre]

Added some commments regarding the protection plates with 325mm front and 320mm rear brakes setup

[cj10jeeper]

Rotors next...

I'd rather have matching design front and rear so the obvious is to just pick up a quality plain rotor (OEM or good make such as EBC at £62 each and add a pair of EBC green stuff pads to match the rear)

However with 108's the through the wheel view matters, so drilled, slotted, dimpled, etc. and a better looking top hat would be an improvement

Brembo seem to do a nice drilled or slotted 325mm for the front, but struggling to find a matching 294 x 19, vented rear? I like those having run them on an X5 for 2 years and cadmium coated they don't corrode and have performed really well.

EBC look promising with several options at around £102 front and a £92 for a rear for various dimpled or slotted designs.

Any other suggestions or web links? Due to weight and strength of £ I'd best stick to UK suppliers.

[Shooter]

I shouldn't have read this thread....

Well, now it's done, if any of you 3.0i owners has a set of front carriers to spare, i'd be more than happy to help you get rid of them !
As for discs, i will probably go myself for StopTech USR slotted rotors. I found a supplier here in France who has decent prices. For pads, most probably Axxis ULT, from the US.

[cj10jeeper]

Managed to do this little project this afternoon, so a few photos of the change:

Special thanks to ZetaTre for pulling together the info to base this upgrade on

Restored the calipers and coated them red to match what I had before.
Very straightforward mechanics to pull off the calipers, carriers, swop over & rebuild, bleed some clean fluid through
Opted to replace all 4 discs and stick with EBC greenstuff pads that I like as they are a good road pad, silent and low dust
I've only put a couple of miles on them, so barely worn the black coating off yet and it's too dark to get any decent photos.

Few quick along the way snaps:

Original 300 mm discs looking a bit tired


Wheel off - forgive the dirt - see how much road salt is dripping on the floor - I hate UK Winter roads


The new 330mm discs look so much bigger


Fitted - EBC coat the discs so appear all black


Through the wheel looks way better and started to reveal the discs silver surface after a short test drive.


I look forward to breaking them in tomorrow and then reporting if there is any significant improvement. Will post some better pictures larer Also plan to wash the car!!!!

[ElegantSpoon]

Looking good

I would have done the calipers in silver

[ZetaTre]

It looks great!!!

[cj10jeeper]

Looking good

I would have done the calipers in silver

Nargh - silver would have been too 'flat' IMHO. Red was a part of the planned overall effect of the upgrades and is just a small touch I've allowed, on what is a very understated series of external mods (front end, AE, CF decals, custom 108's, etc.)

Quick picture I took this afternoon on the roof of a local centre:


Started to break the discs and pads in and the improvement in performance is simply amazing for such a relative small increase in diameter. Still taking it easy, so yet to see how they work in anger.

[Mr Whippy]

What is consumeable cost change like from 300mm>325mm for OE spec discs/pads?

Dave

[cj10jeeper]

Sorry - no idea. Stopped using OE pads and rotors on BMW's a long time ago. I use only aftermarket discs, Brembo or EBC and Greenstuff or Axxis pads, for their low dust characteristics. Frankly I doubt they are any different in price as the 325 disks off the E46 Sport is going to be at least as common as the Z4

As a guide EBC expect around £100 each and pads £60 the front set

[Curtis]

If anyones interested I should have a complete front and rear setup from the Alpina somewhere. The Alpina brakes were based on the 3.0 I believe but I swapped to AP's and M3 axles at 15k miles.

The Alpina specific parts catalogue is below.

http://www.zed-cars.eu/uploads/engtkROADSTER_S.pdf

[cj10jeeper]

Curtis,
The parts cross reference to those of the E46 330, so would give the larger 325mm discs as used on the later 3.0Si
Carriers cross reference to the E46 330 too but the calipers themselves seem unique? Given the carriers, rotors fit then it looks like a straight bolt on set up to me.

In fact gives pretty much what I've just done on the front end

[Herminator]

I'd be interested Curtis, if I knew what I'll be doing with my Z4 in a couple of weeks
I bet someone here will be able to give you more for them than I would though, and sooner.