FTO Drivers Club, Western Australia

[Mitsiman]

RPW has 90% worked out our large brake upgrade for a FTO vehicle upgrading from a 276mm front rotor to a 294mm front brake rotor.

To finish this off though we need a test car to manafacture the kit on.

we would need the car for approx 2 days although it is expected to be finished in the one day.

The person who would like to do this would receive the components at cost price and labour free (Actual pricing to discussed in private).

Teh kti would include

294mm Slotted new rotors
EBC Kevlar green stuff brake pads
Replacement twin piston caliper kit

Anyone interested please contact RPW on 0894431719

David Thomas
www.rpw.com.au
_________________
RPW Mitsubishi Performance Specialists soon to be releasign twin turbo systems for Magna and FTO vehicles.

[vlad]

how much is it going to cost?

[Mitsiman]

The brake kit is going to be test fitted to a customers car hopefully end of this week or early next week so we will have prices and confirmation of kits around then.

David Thomas
_________________
RPW Mitsubishi Performance Specialists soon to be releasign twin turbo systems for Magna and FTO vehicles.

[Mitsiman]

The brake kit is going to be test fitted to a customers car hopefully end of this week or early next week so we will have prices and confirmation of kits around then.

David Thomas
_________________
RPW Mitsubishi Performance Specialists soon to be releasign twin turbo systems for Magna and FTO vehicles.

[elmo]

Hope you got a new calender for this one David....

[wildfaye29]

Hi, would anyone know if the2000 galant VR4 brakes(calipers and rotors are a direct fit for the front n e rears of an FTO?
Anyone got specs of the FTO's rotor and VR4's rotors to compare?

Cheers!
Sam

[RichardH]

You could ring Malcolm Crockenberg and ask him - 9358 0302.

However, I've got a DBA (Disc Brakes Australia) Mitsy parts list here - one that lists the FTO, funnily enough - and it says...

Galant HH5 VR4 Turbo 5/89-93
Front DBA part #: DBA402
Diameter: 276
Orig. height: 45
Orig. thickness: 24
Min. thickness: 22.4
Centre hole: 69
Number of bolt holes: 4

FTO GPX:
Front DBA part #: DBA425
Diameter: 276
Orig. height: 45
Orig. thickness: 24
Min. thickness: 22.4
Centre hole: 69
Number of bolt holes: 5


So it's all just the same... except for the number of bolts holding the wheel on!!!!!!

You could ask Mal to confirm this though.

The DBA list doesn't show rear part number for VR4, so it's probably the same as other Galant models. But you can bet the rear wheels will be 4-bolt if the front wheels are, hehe.

- Rich

[wildfaye29]

Hi Richard,

I was refering to the 2000 VR4s.

I got the following specs but just need to reconfirm the brake height of the VR4 rotors and whether they are a bolt on...other than dat, everything is okie!

FRONT

FTO GPX: 2000 VR4
Diameter: 276 294
Orig. height: 45 ??
Orig. thickness: 24 24
Min. thickness: 22.4 22.4
Centre hole: 69 69
Number of bolt holes: 5 5
No of pots: 2 2
Ventiltated Disc Ventilated Disc

REAR

FTO GPX: 2000VR4
Diameter: 260 284
Orig. height: 41 ??
Orig. thickness: 10 20
Min. thickness: 8.4 18.4
Centre hole: 90 90
Number of bolt holes: 5 5
No of pots: 1 2
Solid Disc Ventilated Disc

I intend to do this upgrade becos i would 1 2 retain e ability to put on 16" when i go onto the tracks, cos brembos from evo 5 onwards r going cost hell alot of money n they only fit 17".

Cheers!
Sam

PS: Dave(Mitsiman)! Incidentally, does your front brake upgrad actually come from a 2000VR4? e specs seems suspiciously familiar. Could you provide more details of them? Would you be attacking e rears as well?

[RichardH]

To be honest, I'm not sure why you're looking to do this work... the FTO brakes are basically EVO I/II/III and do a cracking job.

The only things I could see being necessary are:

(1) Ability of the whole brake assembly to handle higher temps

or

(2) Larger disc area so they have greater ability to cool in moving air on track, ie. attempt to get around hitting (1) above.


For (1), you're talking about having a brake assembly where things like piston dust seals, fluid, etc. are able to see higher peak temperatures without going crispy/boily.

For (2), if you've experienced such a situation in an FTO (and want to not go there again), you might want to start by doing free/cheap stuff like cutting out the inadequate airflow vent slats in the front plastic wheel wells, fitting some simple 90-degree air duct tubing pointing at the calipers, and removing the dust guard metal. That last one involves a bit of hub disassembly, but it would certainly help.


So you'd have to determine when/where exactly you expect brake temperature problems to arise, what you can cheaply do to minimise it, whether you can simply change your approach towards brake temp management (ie. don't get your brakes glowing and then stop dead for a chat with someone, hehe!).


To give a real world example...

I had a good 15-minute non-stop thrash up and down the DTEC tarmac area, learning left-foot-braking, driving 9/10 last year. Big fun! I had stock GPX brakes, no duct holes cut out of the guards at that time and Mintex M1155 pads fitted. Not once did I get any brake fade at all - due to the pad material. Certainly no fluid boiling.

But what I *was* doing was getting the general front caliper assembly hotter than it was designed for, so while I had no brake fade or boiled fluid, I was cooking the piston dust seals.

I also made a critical mistake, in only performing a couple of cooldown laps when I should have taken it up and down the nearby road to really let the whole system get less hot. So when I stopped, that heat just soaked in, made crispy critters of my piston rubber dust seals, slightly boiled my (standard) fluid and made the remaining pad material rubbish bin material.

So looking at (1) above, I would need brakes as tough as nails to withstand parking up so soon after that kind of driving. Very expensive! The cheap option is to do some appropriate cool-down laps.

Looking at (2), larger discs would have transferred more heat to the airstream. But at that time, I hadn't looked into getting an effective airstream past the front wheels. Now I have, I know three things that can be done to get more air. If those don't do the trick, THEN the next option would be bigger rotors.


Note that we haven't touched on actual braking ability at all...! Because in my book the FTO brakes - with good maintenance, rotors and pads - are well balanced, have good pedal feel (dunno about ABS versions though) and are always capable of stopping the car as hard as your tyre rubber will allow.

I'm getting R-spec sticky tyres fitted for MC Motorsport training days soon, and I'm not expecting any brake limitations to be reached - I'm sure I'll still be able to touch the limits of traction (ie. lockup minus 1% ) time after time out there. But I'll post any interesting findings once I've given it a go!


Finally, be aware that changing calipers can sometimes introduce front/rear bias issues that need correcting. So investigate how the FTO brake bias valve stuff works, and if anything can be tweaked. The factory got it pretty right, I reckon, although dry/rain, good/bad tyres, etc. changes the likelihood of locking fronts or rears under threshold braking - for road cars, you're always looking at a "best average setup" really.


Hope this massive brain dump isn't (a) too inaccurate, (b) too stupid or (c) too boring to read!! Of course, feel free to rip strips off anything obviously BS. Physics is physics - if I don't understand the way something works, then let me know. That way, I'll know for next time... hehe.

- Rich

[wildfaye29]

Hmm...

My mate in Singapore fitted a set of DBA gold 425 X-drill/ slotted becos he wrapped the stock rotors. He choose the X-drill ones becos the stock ones cook up real fast hence thought e drills will reduce heat. However, after a short span of 8mths, they warped! OMG

After fitted e rotors e next things done included the following:
1) steel braided hoses
2) higher temp pads and fluid
3) vacuum cylinder
4) brake cylinder stopper

The fitment of the above greatly improved padel feel, bite and brake response but does not aid in brake cooling in anyway.

Hence, the next natural upgrade was calipers and rotor sizes.
We thought of brembos but costs and size of wheels put us off.
Hence we decided the 2000VR4s suited us best.

We are in process of sourcing this parts 2nd hand and intend to look for aftermkt rotors to fit, but unable to verify the original height of the brake hats. Once we do, should be quite a straightforward fit.

We were also initially worried about the brake bias, but looking at the specs of the calipers, it doesn't seem so worrying becos besides the rotors and calipers being bigger proportionately the rear gets vented.

My frens also mentioned if the brake bias ratio of say 70 front/30 rear is fixed on a particular vehicle, even if they upgrade the bigger brakes at the rear, say drums to disc, the ratio doesn't change.
(don't take my word for it...haha...still trying to source for solid evidence)
So basically this upgrade will not affect the bias/ratio at all.

Meanwhile, I will still source for the bias info and the brake specs info.

Cheers!
Sam

[RichardH]

> However, after a short span of 8mths, they warped!

Track driving? ROAD driving?

After belting around and around DTEC tarmac area (short track, negligible straights), it makes you wonder just what people are doing to heat up brakes so hot on road driving that they transfer pad material unevenly!

I've had slotted DBA rotors (vented front) on mine since late 2001. Mucho motorkhana fun. The only time I've needed to skim them was after that time I mentioned, when I foolishly parked up while everything was still hot. Since then (October 2002) I've done a spirited MC Motorsport practice session at least once a month, smelt hot pads on numerous occasions, but always made sure I did the anal retentive cool-down parade to normalise temps if things were especially toasty. My rotors are now a bit blue, have a few stress cracks (2 years old now, and used HARD ), but no juddering brake horrors whatsoever.

To put things into perspective though, I don't do any full-course lap track days. A 48-65 second MC lap isn't going to get anything particularly hot. My road driving isn't going to melt pads or boil fluid - I don't live in the Darling Ranges or tow a double-wide in the FTO, hehe.

...and the only time I've ever smelt Mintex pads on the road has been when I was in the final stages of bedding them in. Zero-to-100-to-20-to-100-to-20-to-100...

- Rich

ps. I've actually moved from Mintex M1155 pad material to M1144 this year. This is now a LESS track-oriented compound... the idea being that a little feedback from the braking system saying "getting real hot now" in the form of initial fade is a GOOD thing, hehe. The M1155 stuff just kept on braking hard and sharp - perfect pedal feel, corner after corner - even though I was building up heat beyond sane levels. I must be getting old to think that less is more, hey!!!

[wildfaye29]

That was street driving, unfortunately...

Yeah, I couldn't believe it either, imagine me lugging an extra 12kg in my luggage back home last november for him and they warped just like dat!

Quality problem? Isolated case? Maybe...don't think I'll bring another set back again...to much hassle!

He's thinking of getting some Project U rotors and pads now, but hell these costs alot more...hmm...I'll stick to my current setup for now until I get convinced of the nil possibility of the brake bias thingy on upsized brakes...

Sam

[RichardH]

Heh. Mine are DBA's, by the way. 425 slotted (but not cross-drilled).

Have a read of this article, if you haven't already seen it...

http://www.stoptech.com/whitepapers/warped_rotors_myth.htm

- Rich

[Mitsiman]

Updates on teh brake packages.

For some reason this forum doesn't send me emails to update me so that is why I haven't responded.

The brake package we are using we are going to contact our test fitter and get him in this week. The rest of the parts we were waiting on have finally arrived.

The brake package will include the following

(A) New Hub assembles to allow teh use of our different caliper and rotor
(B) 295mm Front slotted Rotor
(C) Twin Piston Brake calipers
(D) EBC Kevlar pads "Green STuff"
(E) New front brake hoses

I an assure you this package is virtually the same package other than minor differences to what we use on our magna and some race car magna's and these rotor and brake combo is not warping like DBA rotors.

This combo no my magna is absoloutly amazing for braking I cannot beleie the difference.

The price of this kit is around $1600.00 as a retail price but this is still to be confirmed after final fitment.

There will be no need to alter brake biases nor any other mods - the only major deal is the removal of teh front hubs, and replacement with the new hubs to accomodate teh larger brake rotor (STandard is a 276mm front rotor on these cars).

No there are no plans on changing the rear brakes as to be honest at this moment - we will look at that in the future maybe but we want to finisht eh front package first.
_________________
RPW Mitsubishi Performance Specialists soon to be releasign twin turbo systems for Magna and FTO vehicles.

[Mitsiman]

Updates on teh brake packages.

For some reason this forum doesn't send me emails to update me so that is why I haven't responded.

The brake package we are using we are going to contact our test fitter and get him in this week. The rest of the parts we were waiting on have finally arrived.

The brake package will include the following

(A) New Hub assembles to allow teh use of our different caliper and rotor
(B) 295mm Front slotted Rotor
(C) Twin Piston Brake calipers
(D) EBC Kevlar pads "Green STuff"
(E) New front brake hoses

I an assure you this package is virtually the same package other than minor differences to what we use on our magna and some race car magna's and these rotor and brake combo is not warping like DBA rotors.

This combo no my magna is absoloutly amazing for braking I cannot beleie the difference.

The price of this kit is around $1600.00 as a retail price but this is still to be confirmed after final fitment.

There will be no need to alter brake biases nor any other mods - the only major deal is the removal of teh front hubs, and replacement with the new hubs to accomodate teh larger brake rotor (STandard is a 276mm front rotor on these cars).

No there are no plans on changing the rear brakes as to be honest at this moment - we will look at that in the future maybe but we want to finisht eh front package first.
_________________
RPW Mitsubishi Performance Specialists soon to be releasign twin turbo systems for Magna and FTO vehicles.