nmbcatch21

I was thinking about getting a brake upgrade kit. After driving my father inlaws m5 i just fell in love with the brakes. What do I need to stop as smooth as a bmw. As for the brake experts if you could give me a brief explination of how upgraded brake kits help stop the car better. Thanks

rominl

well for the tls the only upgrade so far is the brembo, wich will run you for around 2300. that's only for the front calipers, rotors, pads, ss lines. to compliete it, also get the rear upgrade that includes rotors, pads, and ss lines (you stay with the stock calipers). together with install (i assume you let people do the install), the whole upgrade should run you for around 3 grands on the tls.

couple of aspects on how the upgrade will help. first would be the rotor size and design. a larger rotor will in general stop the car faster, to some extend. it's just like a lever system, further away from the wheel center it's easier to stop the wheel.

a good design rotors will ben vented, and also drilled or slotted. this is to help ventilation. during braking the rotors get hot. if it gets too hot it will severely affect the braking power of the system. making rotors cool is essentail.

also, larger rotors will have more area for pads to have contact with, and also more area to cool down. that's also good.

on calipers, it's all about number of piston. the stock calipers on tls is 1 piston... very bad.... coz' you totally rely on that one piston to apply all the pressure to the pads on the rotors. the brembo kit is 4 pistons, so it will put pressure a lot more even on the pads and the rotors. brake fade refers to the idea of brake systems getting too hot and loses its braking power. rotor heat is one factor i mentoned, and number of calipers could affect that too.

pads. different kind of pads wil have different results of course. in general metallic pads are better.

ss line. it will help the brak pedal response, and also the response time too. it prevent the brake lines from expanding when heated, so you feel the same kind of pressure after laps at the track.

brake fluid is importnat too if you do a lot of braking for example going to track. normal brake fluid will boil easily and won't be able to stand the heat. good race fluid will boil at 600C, which is more reliable.

reason why you don't do much to the rear setup is that most of the braking is done on the front actually. on the tls, with the front being sooo heavy, 90% of the braking is done by the front. that's why there is no caliper upgrade for the rear, and in fact you almost never see caliper upgrade for any cars' rear brakes.

however not doing anything to the rear is stupid too. braking still has some kind of balance. relying too much on the front will end up not having enough. so you still need a good system at the back to help that 10% braking. in general, upgrding the pads, get a drilled / slotted stock size rear rotor replacement, and ss line will do the job.

the brembo kit for the tls has 12.3" rotors for the front, larger than the stock ones. it's drilled and vented for better cooling. 4 pistons calipers with larger surface area brake pads for better performance. ss lines to help the braking feel.

that's pretty much what i can tell you. one thing though, when you talk about brakes, even by upgrading the brakes, you won't expect to see BIG improvement on the braking distnace. the stock tls has about 128ft for 60-0 braking, and by upgrading the whole brakes to say brembo, maybe you can do 120 or so but not much better. even other sport cars, they hardly achieve around 110 ft. and from what i heard, even formula 1 their stopping distance is about 100 ft. bit brakes mostly help the brake fade problem, help the braking feel and response, and also the look

TopGum

Where did this figure come from? I thought it was in the 146 ft neighborhood.

The Brembo front brake kit comes in a 12.4" for 17" wheels or a 13" for 18" wheels. The 3G figure is right on for install on all four corners. Motul 600 brake fluid is a must.

You can also swap out the stock rotors for KVR's, Powerslot, or Powerstop. You use the same caliper and upgrade the pads and brakelines.

The first upgrade should be a better wheel/tire (especially tire) package. After that, consider the brake upgrade.

Even with all this, your TL-S might not out handle the M5 but it will be a HUGE improvement. RWD rules this turf.

rominl

i got that number from edmunds.com actually i have heard couple of 130ft info here and there.

are you sure the 13" rotors setup will fit on the tls bracket? if so that's good news. coz' 12.4" is kinda small.....

and yes, thanks for the reminder, you NEED new wheels for sure. and it's important to get the right kind, coz' these brakes are HUGE and you need to fit them right

nmbcatch21

would suspension upgrades help stop the car quicker also?? I was thinking that becasue if you eliminate body roll i figure that your stopping distance will be better.

TopGum

Yes Indeed! Look here:

13" Brembo

Springs or coilovers and shocks would likely reduce dive but this probably has more to do with control and balance. I am unsure if it would reduce your stopping distance.

TopGum

I forgot one thing. Spoke curvature is really important for caliper clearance. You have t be careful to choose wheels that will clear the caliper!

dj5

I plan on upgrading my tires when the OEMs wear out and upgrading the brake pads when the OEMs wear out.

IMHO, that's really all you need to do to make a major improvement in braking.

samkws

u r talking a car that doubles the price...

can we use the aftermarket performance brakes that offer to the accord?

850EX

Easiest and most effiecient upgrade is tires.

Heres my preference in order:
1) tires
2) brake pads (and rotors)
3) calipers
4) SS brakelines

rominl

considering the fact that even with that HUGE brakes upgrade doesn't help that much on braking distance, i don't think stiff suspension will help that much at all

rominl

yup, that's why i said wheel size and offset is NOT something you should care. it's the design. it gotta be as small offset as possible and it HAS to be for high disc application

rominl

i would have to disagree. once you try a real brake upgrade that involves everything, it's more than night and day

rominl

not sure about this though.... it might

rominl

tires don't help to reduce brake fade

rominl

wow that's awesome, now that's a nice upgrade. but 13" setup would be around 3 grands i believe....

too bad ap racing doesn't have anything for the tl. i love it

Mr Zipps

I was thinking of getting the stock brakes crossed drilled. I heard that helps alot and the cost is low. Save a few thousand dollars.

Mr
03 ABP TL-S
New Jersey

StanMan

doesn't have to be a small offset at all but on nicer brands, it's called the disc type...

rominl

help in terms of what? heat dissipation yes. brake fade yes. braking power nothing. braking distance it can only be worse

rominl

bingo stan, you are dead on

TopGum

Well, that was four all four corners. I put Powerstop drilled rotors in the rear and Porterfield Hot Street pads on the rears. Goodridge lines all around. If you did just the Brembo upgrade in front. it would be less. I also had it done at the dealer just in case anything went wrong. So I paid some "insurance." I do think the rear upgrade helps in front/rear control. The car just STOPS and stops straight!