4 replies to this topic

[6 ft 5 and fits in a Mini]

Hi all,

New member here. I recently bought a 1992 British Open Classic that needs some work on it. I am in the process of replacing the rear subframe and whilst I have the back end in bits, was wondering about converting the drums to discs.

Is that doable?

Does anyone know if any of the mini spares retailers offer a kit?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[lrostoke]

I think the general concensus as always been unless your building a track car and want the weight saving, for a road car its not worth it...most of the braking is done up front.
You start putting discs on the back then you could affect the braking balance.

But if you want fork out £700

http://www.kentautod...disc-conversion

[6 ft 5 and fits in a Mini]

OK, that's fair enough. It's only for road use.


That's a good website though for spares. Thanks for the tip.

[tiger99]

It would be nice to have rear discs for ease of maintenance. You certainly don't need them for braking effort, even on the track. But, you would need calipers with very small diameter pistons to proportion the braking effort correctly, and to work safely with the limited volumetric displacement of the master cylinder. The pad size is almost irrelevant, it mostly controls the thermal capacity and wear rate, not the braking torque, but a reduced diameter disc does help to reduce the braking torque. Then you need to provide for the handbrake.....

If you can find the right, inexpensive bits from another car (not the very expensive alloy calipers with limited fatigue life that are available), I think it would be worth doing, but only to reduce maintenance, which in my opinion is always a worthwhile objective.

[lrostoke]

The maintenance reasons was why I switched to 7.5" discs on the front of mine rather than the drums.
Personally never had a problem with the drums efficiency even when towing a loaded trailer from Stoke to Cornwall