4th gen CTS-V conversion write-up & video
10-29-2017, 09:33 AM
#1
4th gen CTS-V conversion write-up & video Attachment 718609
Make sure that you have enough room to either side of the car to remove the axle shafts from the rear end housing. You don’t want to get halfway into the removal process to find that your axle is hitting the wall of your garage. Please make sure your car is supported on jack stands or on a lift that allows the front and rear suspension to relax, this makes the majority of the work much easier. If you just have a bottle jack or some rigged means of supporting the car, do not try to attempt any work on your car…at all.
Not all 18” wheels are guaranteed to fit, especially depending on spoke design and offset. Some have a high pad option to choose from. Determine whether the wheels you plan to run ahead of time fit or not. Some might fit with the use of a wheel spacer. That is all up to you. Otherwise, you can contact your wheel manufacturer and they can give you an idea if it will clear or not.
You might need to fine tune braking manners by running a more aggressive brake pad up front and a less aggressive pad in the back or utilize a proportioning valve if you perform an ABS delete. Pad knockback can be prevalent on track or spirited driving when wheel hubs are worn and rear end axle play is excessive even with the stock floating calipers. This can be combated by using new replacement components, tapping the brake pedal to seat the pads (common practice in road racing), anti-knockback springs installed in the calipers or residual pressure valves in the main lines.
Machining necessary:
Modification to the existing uprights is necessary to fit the new caliper bolts as well as the hub bore diameter on the CTS-V brake rotors. This requires you to drill the two holes open a little on the spindle, you can use a 9/16” drill bit as listed above. You can do this on the car, or off. I used a drill press to keep things squared, others have freehanded it. Take your time; use some oil to help the bit do the work more efficiently. If you aren’t sure of yourself in keeping it squared, you can have it opened up at a machine shop (where you’ll need to go anyway for the rotors).
To have the rotor hubs opened up to fit the standard F-body bore, a machine shop should be able to open up the CTS-V brakes up to match the hub bore of your car. If you’re not sure what diameter to use, you can take in your existing stock size f-body rotors to get the hub bore diameter matched which for the late 4th gen is 70.7mm
Parts Used:
Adapter:
A.I. Engineering Conversion from Big Brake Upgrade
Parts included in my order (can be custom tailored, just ask):
AIE Conversion brackets, Stainless rear lines, parking brake
cables, parking brake assembly w/ backing plates, hardware.
Front Rotors:
Optional 2-piece
GM Part #20795300 and #20795302
Original 1-piece
GM Part #25851237 (Left & right)
Rear Rotors:
GM Part # 92245929
Front Calipers: (J56 Brembo)
GM Part #
22885106 & 22885108 RED
20982719 & 20982734 YELLOW
25912967 & 25912477 SILVER
Rear Calipers:
GM Part #
22885101 & 22885103 RED
20982644 & 20982647 YELLOW
25911233 & 25911138 SILVER
Brake lines:
Front:
Flynbye Performance #4GCTSVLINES6POT
Optional:
Flyinbye Perf. Rear “T” block line #LS1REARTLINE
Pin/Caliper Kit:
Front: GM Part #19264181
Rear: GM Part #19264180
Caliper Bolt: M14x45 2.00
Washers/spacers: Grade 8 M14 or ½” washers
Drill bit: 9/16” Drill bit
MISC: Brake fluid, differential fluid + posi additive
OPTIONAL:
Wilwood Residual Pressure valve: 2 x 260-13783
PFC Knockback Springs:
2 x PFC900.900.106.02
1 x PFC900.900.106.01
Front Piston Bore: 38/34/30mm
Rear Piston Bore: 32/28mm
Strano Parts Master Cylinder Brace: SP9302
Strano Parts Front Hub upgrade: SP4000
Front brakes:
Disassembly:
1) Raise car up safely where all four wheels are free to rotate. Securely placed jack stands or a lift is preferred. It is easier to do the work on the rear end with the rear axle left hanging and the jack stands or lift pads on the chassis.
2) Remove front wheels
3) Remove brake caliper and bracket from the spindle (two bolts), move the caliper to the side for now without disconnecting the brake lines. This will cut down on fluid loss and decrease the chance of you running the master cylinder dry.
4) Remove stock rotors; mark them for reference (LF/RF).
5) Using the 9/16” bit, open up the two spindle holes. Clean surface off/out and test fit with new bolts, you can even test fit the calipers as well to make sure everything sits flush on the machined pad on the spindle. Start of by hand tightening so you don’t cross thread that expensive caliper! Take caliper off once you’ve made sure everything fits properly.
This is actually a great opportunity to install ARP wheel studs, especially if you plan to use wheel spacers in the future or actually produce some respectable horsepower. Just be careful with the wheel speed sensors.
Assembly:
1) Install new rotor. I like to snug the rotor down onto the hub with some open end lugnuts w/ washers as it is usually tight the first time. This will help with aligning the caliper on the rotors.
2) Install new caliper. Use the spacers/washers to align the caliper to where it is centered over the rotor. Torque to 96 lb ft.
3) Install brake pads.
4) Unbolt f-body brake line in the wheel-well; install new CTS-V conversion brake line.
Rear Brakes:
Disassembly:
1) Drain differential fluid into a drain pan. While this goes on, move to #2.
2) Remove rear wheels.
3) Make sure parking brake is released, unbolt calipers, and move aside.
4) Remove rotors; mark (LR/RR).
5) Remove parking brake cables.
6) Remove thrust plate from differential or whatever retaining plate depending upon the center section you have. You might need to put car in neutral.
7) Push on the axle hubs towards the centerline of the car, this will relax the c-clips. Remove the c-clips (label left and right).
8) Remove axles (label left and right).
9) Remove backing plate from axle tube (4 bolts each side).
Once again, this is actually a great opportunity to install ARP wheel studs!
Assembly:
1) Rub some axle grease on the seals on the end of the axle tubes as well as the bearings and axle splines (grease on the splines helps keep those c-clips from falling off and helps keep the seals from leaking).
2) Install new AIE Brackets onto axle tube, caliper pads facing towards front of car.
3) Install CTS-V backing plates.
4) Reinstall axles, push in all the way but make sure you don’t scratch the bearings with the axle splines.
5) Install c-clips, then pull on axles to seat them. Reinstall thrust plate to spec.
6) Install CTS-V rotors.
7) Install CTS-V calipers. Hand tighten the bolts, then torque to 88 lb ft.
8) Run new parking brake cables. You may or may not need a return spring on the end of these. Some brakes might return to neutral with ease, others might need some extra persuasion. I used the springs off the original f-body cables and installed them. You might need to adjust the parking brake cable for proper engagement.
9) Install brake pads, then the new brake lines (I installed a braided T-line from the chassis to axle so everything is completely upgraded).
Final steps:
1) Bleed brakes alternating inside caliper bleed screw, then outside. Starting from passenger rear, driver’s side rear, passenger side front, driver’s side front. Do this until fluid runs clear and you have a firm pedal.
2) Reinstall differential cover, refill.
3) Reinstall wheels.
4) Test brakes for safe operation!
Businesses where parts were sourced:
1) Brackets, cables, backing plates: Bigbrakeupgrade (A.I. Engineering)
2) Rotors/Calipers/Pins/Pads: Scoggin Dickey Parts Center
3) Brake Hose/Adapters: Flynbye
4) Strano Parts Master Cylinder Brace + other parts: Strano Parts
https://instagram.com/warshrike/
facebook.com/projectWarShrike/
https://www.youtube.com/WarShrike
Technical write-up
CTS-V Brake Upgrade: 4th Gen F-body
This is a basic write-up on the CTS-V V2 brake upgrade for the 4th gen F-body equipped with the 98-02 style uprights. I am not sure if the rear brake upgrade will work on cars with the 4-channel ABS/Traction control as this install was done on a 3-channel ABS car, and modifications might need to be made.CTS-V Brake Upgrade: 4th Gen F-body
Make sure that you have enough room to either side of the car to remove the axle shafts from the rear end housing. You don’t want to get halfway into the removal process to find that your axle is hitting the wall of your garage. Please make sure your car is supported on jack stands or on a lift that allows the front and rear suspension to relax, this makes the majority of the work much easier. If you just have a bottle jack or some rigged means of supporting the car, do not try to attempt any work on your car…at all.
Not all 18” wheels are guaranteed to fit, especially depending on spoke design and offset. Some have a high pad option to choose from. Determine whether the wheels you plan to run ahead of time fit or not. Some might fit with the use of a wheel spacer. That is all up to you. Otherwise, you can contact your wheel manufacturer and they can give you an idea if it will clear or not.
You might need to fine tune braking manners by running a more aggressive brake pad up front and a less aggressive pad in the back or utilize a proportioning valve if you perform an ABS delete. Pad knockback can be prevalent on track or spirited driving when wheel hubs are worn and rear end axle play is excessive even with the stock floating calipers. This can be combated by using new replacement components, tapping the brake pedal to seat the pads (common practice in road racing), anti-knockback springs installed in the calipers or residual pressure valves in the main lines.
Machining necessary:
Modification to the existing uprights is necessary to fit the new caliper bolts as well as the hub bore diameter on the CTS-V brake rotors. This requires you to drill the two holes open a little on the spindle, you can use a 9/16” drill bit as listed above. You can do this on the car, or off. I used a drill press to keep things squared, others have freehanded it. Take your time; use some oil to help the bit do the work more efficiently. If you aren’t sure of yourself in keeping it squared, you can have it opened up at a machine shop (where you’ll need to go anyway for the rotors).
To have the rotor hubs opened up to fit the standard F-body bore, a machine shop should be able to open up the CTS-V brakes up to match the hub bore of your car. If you’re not sure what diameter to use, you can take in your existing stock size f-body rotors to get the hub bore diameter matched which for the late 4th gen is 70.7mm
Parts Used:
Adapter:
A.I. Engineering Conversion from Big Brake Upgrade
Parts included in my order (can be custom tailored, just ask):
AIE Conversion brackets, Stainless rear lines, parking brake
cables, parking brake assembly w/ backing plates, hardware.
Front Rotors:
Optional 2-piece
GM Part #20795300 and #20795302
Original 1-piece
GM Part #25851237 (Left & right)
Rear Rotors:
GM Part # 92245929
Front Calipers: (J56 Brembo)
GM Part #
22885106 & 22885108 RED
20982719 & 20982734 YELLOW
25912967 & 25912477 SILVER
Rear Calipers:
GM Part #
22885101 & 22885103 RED
20982644 & 20982647 YELLOW
25911233 & 25911138 SILVER
Brake lines:
Front:
Flynbye Performance #4GCTSVLINES6POT
Optional:
Flyinbye Perf. Rear “T” block line #LS1REARTLINE
Pin/Caliper Kit:
Front: GM Part #19264181
Rear: GM Part #19264180
Caliper Bolt: M14x45 2.00
Washers/spacers: Grade 8 M14 or ½” washers
Drill bit: 9/16” Drill bit
MISC: Brake fluid, differential fluid + posi additive
OPTIONAL:
Wilwood Residual Pressure valve: 2 x 260-13783
PFC Knockback Springs:
2 x PFC900.900.106.02
1 x PFC900.900.106.01
Front Piston Bore: 38/34/30mm
Rear Piston Bore: 32/28mm
Strano Parts Master Cylinder Brace: SP9302
Strano Parts Front Hub upgrade: SP4000
Front brakes:
Disassembly:
1) Raise car up safely where all four wheels are free to rotate. Securely placed jack stands or a lift is preferred. It is easier to do the work on the rear end with the rear axle left hanging and the jack stands or lift pads on the chassis.
2) Remove front wheels
3) Remove brake caliper and bracket from the spindle (two bolts), move the caliper to the side for now without disconnecting the brake lines. This will cut down on fluid loss and decrease the chance of you running the master cylinder dry.
4) Remove stock rotors; mark them for reference (LF/RF).
5) Using the 9/16” bit, open up the two spindle holes. Clean surface off/out and test fit with new bolts, you can even test fit the calipers as well to make sure everything sits flush on the machined pad on the spindle. Start of by hand tightening so you don’t cross thread that expensive caliper! Take caliper off once you’ve made sure everything fits properly.
This is actually a great opportunity to install ARP wheel studs, especially if you plan to use wheel spacers in the future or actually produce some respectable horsepower. Just be careful with the wheel speed sensors.
Assembly:
1) Install new rotor. I like to snug the rotor down onto the hub with some open end lugnuts w/ washers as it is usually tight the first time. This will help with aligning the caliper on the rotors.
2) Install new caliper. Use the spacers/washers to align the caliper to where it is centered over the rotor. Torque to 96 lb ft.
3) Install brake pads.
4) Unbolt f-body brake line in the wheel-well; install new CTS-V conversion brake line.
Rear Brakes:
Disassembly:
1) Drain differential fluid into a drain pan. While this goes on, move to #2.
2) Remove rear wheels.
3) Make sure parking brake is released, unbolt calipers, and move aside.
4) Remove rotors; mark (LR/RR).
5) Remove parking brake cables.
6) Remove thrust plate from differential or whatever retaining plate depending upon the center section you have. You might need to put car in neutral.
7) Push on the axle hubs towards the centerline of the car, this will relax the c-clips. Remove the c-clips (label left and right).
8) Remove axles (label left and right).
9) Remove backing plate from axle tube (4 bolts each side).
Once again, this is actually a great opportunity to install ARP wheel studs!
Assembly:
1) Rub some axle grease on the seals on the end of the axle tubes as well as the bearings and axle splines (grease on the splines helps keep those c-clips from falling off and helps keep the seals from leaking).
2) Install new AIE Brackets onto axle tube, caliper pads facing towards front of car.
3) Install CTS-V backing plates.
4) Reinstall axles, push in all the way but make sure you don’t scratch the bearings with the axle splines.
5) Install c-clips, then pull on axles to seat them. Reinstall thrust plate to spec.
6) Install CTS-V rotors.
7) Install CTS-V calipers. Hand tighten the bolts, then torque to 88 lb ft.
8) Run new parking brake cables. You may or may not need a return spring on the end of these. Some brakes might return to neutral with ease, others might need some extra persuasion. I used the springs off the original f-body cables and installed them. You might need to adjust the parking brake cable for proper engagement.
9) Install brake pads, then the new brake lines (I installed a braided T-line from the chassis to axle so everything is completely upgraded).
Final steps:
1) Bleed brakes alternating inside caliper bleed screw, then outside. Starting from passenger rear, driver’s side rear, passenger side front, driver’s side front. Do this until fluid runs clear and you have a firm pedal.
2) Reinstall differential cover, refill.
3) Reinstall wheels.
4) Test brakes for safe operation!
Businesses where parts were sourced:
1) Brackets, cables, backing plates: Bigbrakeupgrade (A.I. Engineering)
2) Rotors/Calipers/Pins/Pads: Scoggin Dickey Parts Center
3) Brake Hose/Adapters: Flynbye
4) Strano Parts Master Cylinder Brace + other parts: Strano Parts
https://instagram.com/warshrike/ facebook.com/projectWarShrike/https://www.youtube.com/WarShrike
Last edited by WarShrike; 09-16-2019 at 11:17 AM.
The following users liked this post:
LS1HIGHLIFE (12-31-2022)
11-09-2017, 06:58 AM
#6
TECH Enthusiast
Why did you go with the gen2 ctsv 6 pot front brake setup vs to gen1 ctsv 4 pot front brake setup? No need to modify spindles, just machine hub bore on 5th gen Camaro rotors.
How is the performance so far for you? Pedal feel? Front/rear bias? ABS modulation?
Thank you
How is the performance so far for you? Pedal feel? Front/rear bias? ABS modulation?
Thank you
11-09-2017, 09:24 AM
#7
2) I planned on doing the rears as well.
3) 4 pot front and rear would have looked odd.
4) The amount of material you hone out of the brake caliper mounting tabs is pretty small, there's still a solid radius of metal around the hole.
Pedal feel is perfect. Brakes respond immediately.
Bias is fine, but I'm driving a V6 car so balance of the car is probably a bit different. Have not experienced any axle tramp under braking.
ABS modulation is working just fine, as mentioned above, no axle tramp, which is aggravated by our slow as ***** ABS programming.
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11-10-2017, 06:27 AM
#8
TECH Enthusiast
Yea, i think you got away with doing the fronts with 6pots since you did the rear with the 4 pots as well. Bias is happy. 6 pot only up front would have been not same results.
Drilling of the spindles is plenty safe, absolutely. The spindles are hard to come by though, only available used OEM. That's mine and other's draw back to boring the mount holes. You're committed to the 14mm hardware now.
Glad it's working well. Indeed does look tremendous on there
Additional question, with the rear brake package you installed... this is not a c-clip eliminator kit or semi/full floater kit, correct? So the axles are still moving left-to-right, making the discs grind into the pads even more so than OEM non-fixed calipers, since these calipers are now fixed. Pushing the pistons into the caliper, creating pad knockback. That is why solid rear axle car from the factory never came with fixed rear calipers, just traditional clamshell caliper
Drilling of the spindles is plenty safe, absolutely. The spindles are hard to come by though, only available used OEM. That's mine and other's draw back to boring the mount holes. You're committed to the 14mm hardware now.
Glad it's working well. Indeed does look tremendous on there
Additional question, with the rear brake package you installed... this is not a c-clip eliminator kit or semi/full floater kit, correct? So the axles are still moving left-to-right, making the discs grind into the pads even more so than OEM non-fixed calipers, since these calipers are now fixed. Pushing the pistons into the caliper, creating pad knockback. That is why solid rear axle car from the factory never came with fixed rear calipers, just traditional clamshell caliper
Last edited by dojob; 11-10-2017 at 07:22 AM.
11-10-2017, 01:30 PM
#9
You're committed to the 14mm hardware now.
Additional question, with the rear brake package you installed... this is not a c-clip eliminator kit or semi/full floater kit, correct?
There are ways to counteract this.
Convert to a full floating axle rear end design, $$$$.
Add knockback springs or residual pressure valves, $ (mentioned in the write-up).
Tap-up on the brake pedal before the normal braking zone, preloading the pistons and settling them back into place, FREE.
For me, I rebuilt the entire rear end and used the thickest c-clips that I could fit in there to keep the axle tight. I also replaced the front wheel hubs with SKF Corvette Race hubs and the pedal feel has been solid the whole time. Some people experience knockback that is the result of a combination of things, including sloppy front hubs pushing the rotor into the calipers.
Knockback is even present on some IRS cars and is exacerbated by larger diameter rotors.
Here's a great writeup by a racer regarding knock-back along with their solutions:
http://www.stoptech.com/technical-su.../pad-knockback
The following users liked this post:
LS1HIGHLIFE (12-31-2022)
06-28-2018, 09:28 PM
#19
I completely rebuilt the rear end before the brake install and used tighter c-clips. I also am running SKF corvette front hubs so any movement of the front rotors side to side is limited greatly.
We'll see what happens once I start running 315s.
