What a weird post! I LAUGH at you all! GAY?...I'll describe gay for you guys... Gay is arguing about apples and oranges. Hot Rods were built with disc brakes. FACT. But not ALL of them. 40's Hot Rods weren't...50's Rods might have had some funky ones and lotsa 60's Rods had good or bad versions tacked on. GAY only enters into it if your buying blingy style carbon fiber-ceramic WHATEVER kits for your 50's style, primed up HOT ROD...and then trying to p*** it off as a TRADITIONAL "FIFTIES'or 'FORTIES' STYLE build up...because you think you can "HIDE" them with stupid looking "pie plates"(huh?). If you run modern discs your absolutely out of the 40's and 50's...can you live with that? Unless total traditionalism is your bag (and that FINE by me 'cause I like it!) a set of discs isn't gonna mess up your life... but don't HIDE them! FLAUNT them! Cross drill them and run metallic pads! Make those home adapted ****gers a focal point...and add home hammered brake cooling scoops while your at it! HOT ROD them...but don't call them era correct for the early years. HATCH...BOB...ETC... You guys are SO ABOVE stressing over this **** its not even funny to watch. tsk...tsk. Come on guys...you can see this is a baited post can't ya!?!? Don't go off the deep end over this stuff... Merry Christmas!
My name is mike and I am a jock......and.......I also use drum brakes on my hotrod. What should I do? I am confused. Bob?
Hahaha Dude you should join a soccer team or **** some dudes mom. Yeah, Apples and Oranges, That's why I kept saying this post is gay..... I'm not stressed, I'm just screwing around, Hatch knows he's a ***.. Haha Frying pans are for making eggs.
wow, i didnt expect this to go to 7 pages, allot of intersting oppinions, even though thats not what i was looking for. It all comes down to whats important to you. When i started this car i had a certain idea of how i wanted things to be. and as i built it it didnt change, more evolved. Its become much more of a performance oriented thing than a traditional piece. I wanna build it to ****ing haul *** and its gonna be faster than most of the ratrods around. Like bob said its all about comprimises. But i do agree, why hide em... wes
[ QUOTE ] Hahaha Dude you should join a soccer team or **** some dudes mom [/ QUOTE ] Stop already! LOL I built my car for going to soccer games and not car shows!
i have them on my a. sinse everyone else has added their thoughts on disk here's mine. if you have enough engine that you can rip off some tread by barely touching the pedal you need discs. i have had several cars with drums and even an a truck with no front brakes. one car was a 25 t with a pretty potent 302 in it, with skinny rear tires it was actually hard to hit the gas without at least a chirp of the tires. one time i punched it a little while going up a hill at about 30-40 mph, the tires let loose and the throttle stuck for a split second the car kinda drifted to the left and i hit the brakes. it wasn't bad but i did hit the planter/centerdivide enough to **** up the track nose. i think if the car had disks on the front i would have been able to staighten it out and been fine. if you are just a cruiser type person you could get away with the drums in a lower horsepower car. but if you like to light em up or do any kind of racing i would go with the disks. also just to add a little more heat to the fire on how they used to do it, if the car was a hot rod it was raced and all the money was spent on performance parts first ie. engine, brakes, suspension. if the owner was more worried about looks and the car wasn't raced it was a street rod(roadster). even though disks weren't readily avaliable back then i think if they were more hot rodders would spend the money for them instead of spending the cash to chrome plate their backing plates like the street rodders did. again this is just my opinion but if your guestioning weather or not you need them i'd say be on the safe side and get them. if after a while they really start to bug you than put a flathead or 4 cyl in the coupe and change to drums
I think you should use what ever you want to!! My opinion: i like looks of 40 ford brakes with finned drums, i can tell a fake in a second, but they are going for the look, and getting safety too. My brakes in my 34 p/u (40 juice, finned buick drums) work awsome, they never ever pull, they are very responsive (and at all speeds) and feel really good, ive had a few close ones (deer) and had no trouble avoiding it, so i feel real safe with the drum brakes. another thing i jsut thought of: can your brakes have better grabbing power than your tires?? Meaning if you lock up your tires your worse off? Skidding is bad, then you really have no control. just rambling on now!!! JEFF
Hey man just my .02. After blowing through a stop light the other day at about 50 Mph after racing a kid in a new truck I am gonna put discs on my buick and then the rest of my cars will have em. I had brake fade at about 100mph and it just would not slow down. I was pulling so hard on the steering wheel to push my foot down I thought that U was gonna break the wheel off. Scary **** those drum brakes. SLAMIT
good, bad...............i'm gonna run discs on my '36 because i got an older used kit from sac for $100 (with the spindles and rebushed pins).
Drum brakes do not work. In fact, until the disk brake was invented in 1958, cars were not driven. Automobiles sat in driveways and garages and were never used. In 1958, the invention of the "disk" brake finally made cars drivable. They couldn't go very fast or far, of course, without radial tires or electronic fuel injection, invented 1967 and 1983 respectively. I realise that a lot of hambers are too young to remember those dangerous days of bias ply tires and drum brakes. It was truely a terrible time for mankind, people died by the millions.... Get real, we made thousands upon thousands of cars with drum brakes, and we even used to make them with just rear brakes. People seem to get ideas into their heads about this or that ideas like "disk brakes work better than drum brakes" or "independent front suspesnions ride better than straight axle front ends" and call them facts. I'd dare anyone to prove to me that drum brakes aren't as safe as disks. There is only one measurable difference between drums and disks. Disks can dissipate heat more rapidly than drums. that is it. how heat dissipation relates to safety, i have no idea, namely because it doesn't. David
4-13 FWIW.....I agree. And to each their own, but heres my .002..... A drum brake by DESIGN has a larger friction area/surface for those shoes to rub against to wash off speed....hence, the higher heat and greater chance of fade under REPEATED, HARD BRAKING conditions. So they technically have more stopping power/ability but dont handle high temps too well. The key word here guys is REPEATED...do you guys run your rides around a circle track, Indy or from one stoplight to the other CONTINUOUSLY ?? Me thinks not. Ventilated discs are superior because of their resistance to heat and lack of maintenance. But one thing you guys havent mentioned is....the reason the Big Three in Detroit went to discs in the first place. Discs although marketed as purely a "safety innovation", were simpler and cheaper to manufacture and reduced unsprung weight too....an important consideration. Pedal effort was not reduced by using disc brakes until the advent of boosted brakes on cheeper cars....most boosted disc cars were initially pricey, ie: Lincolns, Cads, Buicks, Chryslers, Olds etc. In saying all of this....I think Bobleed hit it on the head. My 32 3W coupe is flathead powered and I am running the juice Bendix drums brakes off a 54 F100. Now I have a mate Stateside who rums this combo on his 32 and tells me if he stomps on the brakes.....hes likely to get a nosebleed !! So I figure that should be plenty OK for my requirements....which include cruising and the odd blast on the street or track. Remember, the F100 brakes are more efficient, have a larger friction surface, came off a 2 X heavier vehicle, and work better than the non adjustable early ford units. That being said, if I wasnt satisfied with the Bendix F100 drum brakes, then I would reluctantly go to discs....I wanna be around to enjoy my ride after all the skinned knuckles and thrashing to get it done MY way... Rat
Disc brakes,wes? Just hide'm with a couple of the early picture discs from WHAM,and youll be fine. Kool to see youre alive dude. You really have been planning this loud comeback,huh?
biggest reason for me putting the discs on the front of my hot rod was to avoid the feeling I got from trying to slow my pickup down at the end of the quarter in time to make the second turnout. I am surprised this thread is still near the top, makes me the think of the accuracy of the eye witness testimony, facts mean very little in light of emotion. that seems to be the main gist of this thread, use what ever life saving device you want based solely on your emotional attachment. and use plenty of derogatory statements towards anyone who questions your emotions. Paul
I have a quersion. If my MC is HIGER than my front calipers,will I need a Residual valve in the line? ?? Oh I think we need a post about antilock brakes on a Ratrodd,and if so will it help if your GAY?? Spark-O Maniac
[ QUOTE ] on my 31 im going to run disks but im mounting the caliper at the 6 o clock position to hide it as much as i can [/ QUOTE ] Gonna be difficult to bleed them with the bleeder screw on the bottom.... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ [ QUOTE ] A drum brake by DESIGN has a larger friction area/surface for those shoes to rub against to wash off speed....hence, the higher heat and greater chance of fade under REPEATED, HARD BRAKING conditions. So they technically have more stopping power/ability but dont handle high temps too well. [/ QUOTE ] Maybe . . . the disc caliper can apply a higher clamping force than a drum brake system can push outward . . . but you knew that. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Drum brakes can be made to stop quite well. As well as discs in my opinion. Fade is not the problem for light to mid-weight hot rods that most think it is. How many times do you get into a situation where repeated and hard use of the brakes is required? Not often and the only scenario I can think of there is fast running on a twisty mountain road. Traffic? No big deal. Car weight enters into it and fade can be a lesser problem by selecting the right grade of lining material. Lining material selection is the key to good drum braking. Back in the day we had our shoes relined with Velvetouch sintered metallic brake lining. (Sintered being a finely powdered metal with a ceramic binder.) That made my 100 mph in the quarter Olds powered 50 Ford coupe pull down very well. It also made my prone to fade the brakes 57 Buick Roadmaster (the tow car for the coupe) stop way better than the factory linings did. Most times the factory Buick linings would fade from a hard 65-70 mph stop - without the coupe in tow. I'm not sure if Velvetouch linings are available nowadays. We got ours done at a small brake outfit in North Hollywood near the Burbank airport. They did a lot of relining for aircraft drum brakes as well as for the cars running the Bonelli Stadium/Saugus circle track. All the circle burners running stock cars used Velvetouch lined drum brakes on their early-late 50's era cars. At least the successful ones did. Having said all that, I'm running discs on both of my roadsters. The one on the road - the other's in the rolling around collecting dust of late stage - stops like nobody's business with the 68-70 Mustang disc brakes up front and 68 Merc wagon drums in back. Lotsa fun to run up to the sharp turnoff (90 degrees) to my old house cranking off 65 or so, get real close to the turnoff and lay on the brakes real hard. All this BS about the danger element in hot rods is just that. BS. Back in the day that most consider trad, guys were improving their cars everywhere they could. It didn't bother them in the least to yank a good operating drum system out of a car and install discs. In my book hot rods are all about performance and going fast. Looking good was a close second, but performance was the name of the game. Trad wasn't worried about much at all. If your car isn't fun to drive - and safe - why bother?
Would running Kinmont discs be considered "non-traditional" ? How about my early 60's Halibrand lobsters ?
anyone here ever drive in a hard rain (enough to get the water up to the curbs) with drum brakes? where is your stopping power then? discs don't washout like drums.
I've run drums on several vehicles... One was a respectable 302 powered 68 Mustang. I made MANY long runs at high speed in that car and the brakes were junk over 90-100 mph. TOTAL fade by the time you got her down to 10-15 mph and you just eased to a stop! SCARY, but I was 19. LoL Had a custom 73 Ford Econoline with the BIG drums and it worked EXCELLENT! No noticeable fade bringing all that weight to a stop from...70 odd MPH on the highway. Then I did a swap to get the little small bolt pattern Econoline drums so I could use the custom wheels from the old Stang. BAD MOVE! You could smell them burning up as you drove down the hills and fade was a problem. My FJ 40 Landcruiser HAD drums, and they stopped the beast well...as long as you hadn't driven thru a puddle or a stream! Once they were wet they were unpredictable! Hitting the brakes was a coin toss on which way the brakes would pull. Didn't have that problem with the Mustang or the van! Foreign junk! Hahaha I have no fear of drums. You just need (un)common sense in your setup of them. I think they work fine in normal use and will be using the F100 style on my car. Just make sure you size them right (too big is better!), adjust them right and make sure the drums are well within spec for thickness. Thats where the heat gets absorbed so you need the thickness much more than a disc would. If you have problems making a good stop initial stop with a reasonably cool drum brake you have setup issues in my opinion. Drums fail from REPEATED or extremely hard stops...not from running to the store! Drums expand and give a lower pedal as they heat too...you can feel the pedal drop if you over work them. It's like heating a bearing to get it to grow so you can drop it over a shaft. Discs expand as well, but its TOWARDS the pads not away from them so they can still work when they actually turn red from the heat. Drums don't provide that capability and will bite you if you push them too far... You just need to understand and respect them! Does anyone know a nice cast iron finned drum that fits the 56 F100 backing plate? I can see that being a big improvement, especially with vented wheels for air circulation instead of solids.
Noob opinion: I thought long and hard about removing a perfectly good set of disc brakes from my no fendered 32. Had a set of drum stuff ready to buy. I also prefer the "look" of drums. I live in a congested area and my kids ride with me. The discs are staying and I have a bit more peace of mind. I have enough maintenance to do and don't need to add brakes to the list. I'm sure a lot of guys on here would hate my SBC powered back halved ladder bar coupe. But I'm OK with that. Jim
[ QUOTE ] Does anyone know a nice cast iron finned drum that fits the 56 F100 backing plate? [/ QUOTE ] Seems like a HAMBr mentioned using a 60's era Lincoln rear drum a while back. (12" diameter I believe. Izzat the same as the F100?) Might make a post on that and see what you get.
ok - drums have a larger amount of contact area for brake material. drums suffer from heat fade and are scary as hell when wet. I've been knocking around the idea of drilling a set of drums for a while now. Drilling through the round part not the horizontal. My thinking is that it would vent the drum and also sluice out any water inside. What do you think? Not to hijack or redirect a post where we all sit around and talk about how gay it is to get *******s from soccer moms or anything Lounge
Dude...there was a website/article I saw where a mob in Huntington Beach(???) cross drilled the friction surfaces on drums to enable them to expel water and brake dust, cool better and enhance their efficiency. Cant rememeber where I saw it ( ) but to answer your question, its has been done before and its supposed to work very well. Rat
Ok, I know this is mainly related to early rods and such but what if I want to convert my 49 Ford drums to disk. Any recommendations or kits out there. I looked at speedway but only say pre 49 kits and mustang II stuff. I have stock IFS...hope this doesn't throw another wrench into the mix.
[ QUOTE ] OK for cars with flatheads that can't go over 60 [/ QUOTE ] Nope. drum brakes work worth a fist full of piss on flatheads too. And when I sell the front and rear 46 juice set-up to someone, it will offset the cost of the disc conversion. I won't be "trad" anymore though. Guess i'll just be "gay" and flounder in my own mediocrity. That's cool though. i do what i want and build cars to drive and be reliable. No arguments from me on either side of the coin. Just my opinion.
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