VTTRAPNTA

I'm looking into the wilwood superlite 6 big brake kit for 1262.99

or

Baer Claw Front Brake system for around $1000

I'm just wondering what's a better system. I believe the Baer is just a 2 piston caliper where the wilwood in a 6 piston design. Also, the wilwood system states that it's superlite. Does anyone have opinions or know for sure?

Any help is greatly appreciated. This is for my best friend who just came across some cash.

thanks,

Al

2FAST4U

Go Wilwood very nice system. Better than the Baer kit for kit! I have it on my car and it is one of my favorite mods.

VTTRAPNTA

How much would you say the kit improved on your 60-0 distance. Or is the difference more of the lack of fade compared to the stock brakes?

Al

98_1LE

iTrader: (17)

I am not sure which is better, but I am sure both are a fine setup.

Fade can easily be eliminated on the stock brakes with good fluid and a decent set of front pads.

Stopping distance is more of a function of tires on our cars than brakes. If your brakes can apply enough torque to lock the wheel, or cause an ABS event, which they will do with good pads even at speed, more brakes are not going to stop you any faster. Sticky tires will do more for performance and handling than any other mod.

ssdrivingbastard

I got wilwood all around. Great set up!! Get them!!!!! I can E-mail you pics if you want.

SILVER BULLET

iTrader: (1)

I have the Baer system w/ 4 piston calipers and I love it. I got exactly what I paid for. Stopping power is insanely better than stock.

Sent you a pic

2001CamaroGuy

iTrader: (6)

This is an entirely unfair comparison. You can’t compare the Wilwood 6 piston to the Baer 2 piston....its apples and oranges.... <img border="0" alt="[barf]" title="" src="graemlins/gr_barf.gif" /> MUSTANGS and <img border="0" alt="[worship]" title="" src="graemlins/gr_hail.gif" /> Corvettes. Remember the Baer 2 piston is basically the same caliper that comes from the factory on our cars (they are both made by PBR).

You get what you pay for. The Baer 6 piston is over $3500 for the front, where as the Wilwood 6 piston is $1300 for the front.

I have always felt that Baer was about the best bakes around but they cost way too much $$$. When I get the money I'm going to go with the Wilwood. Wilwood is another top quality company and they have been around for a long time.

for all out race/loads of $$$ to burn = Baer
for everything else = Wilwood

Chris

<small>[ February 12, 2003, 11:59 PM: Message edited by: 2001CamaroGuy ]</small>

DONAIMIAN

iTrader: (18)

Go with the Baer alcon 6 piston kit with the 15 inch rotors <img border="0" title="" alt="[Razz]" src="gr_images/icons/tongue.gif" />
FWIW I think that the willwod kit is more comparable to the baer alcon 4 piston kit with the 13 inch rotors. It all comes down to how much you wana spend and how fast you wana stop. If I had the monet to, I would go with the baer kit. But since I dont, I prefer to save and get the baer kit with all around.

Prospeed Motorsport

I'm going to suggest my kit as a (much better and less expensive) alternative.

There has been a lot of discussion regarding this topic on the LS1 forum over the last yr. I would NOT EVER suggest the Wilwood kit on a street car. The Wilwood kit is a RACE caliper. It does NOT have any dust seals or dust boots on the pistons. Talk to Wilwood, they will be the first to tell you all but one (the new Radialite 4 piston) of their aftermarket calipers were designed as race calipers. This means they were designed to be torn down, cleaned and rebuilt after every event. Wilwwod will also tell you that if you do use them in a street environment you should rebuild them every 3-4 months to be safe. There is not a single caliper manufacturer in the world that produces/sells a street caliper without some kind of protection against crap getting into the piston bores. I know there are lots of guys out there with the Wilwood stuff and I firmly believe someone is just an incident away. And, if/when that happens, you will not be able to go after Wilwood for anything as they will say, "For race applications only. If you installed it on a street car, you are using it in an inappropriate manner, we're not responsible." Trust me I had this exact conversation with Doug Burke, Wilwood's VP of Sales & Marketing.

And finally, the $1200 Wilwood kit does NOT include pads or the high temp pistons. IF you price the kit with the high temp pistons, (which you will need on the track to keep from boiling the brake fluid) the kit is much closer to about $2000.

OK, all that said, the Baer 4 or 6 piston kit is a good kit. Alcon makes fine world class brake products. But they are very pricy. Also the Brembo and Stoptech kits are good kits. They both use the same size 2 piece caliper. And finally the Movit kit is a good kit. It uses the exact same monobolc Porsche sourced (but repainted) caliper/rotor components as the Prospeed kit, but costs more

I have a brake kit comparison chart at http://www.prospeedmotorsport.com/brake_kit_compare.htm You might to go through this line by line to get a good comparison of the kits including the price of replacment rotors.

And yes, the web site mentions I am getting out of the BBK biz. But until I sell the remainder of my kit inventory (14 kits) I will continue to sell them. They are $1995 for the 4 piston kit (the calipers and rotors are from a Porsche 996tt) and there is an optional 6 piston kit (the calipers and rotors are from a Porsche GT2) for $2995. For a quick comparison, the Brembo kit is $2995, the Movit kit is $2695 (this is literally the exact same kit as mine) the Baer/Alcon 4 piston is $2845 and the 6 piston is $3725 and finally the Stoptech kit is $2595. And all the prices for replacement rotors are a lot higher than mine.

I suggest you check all this out before you purchase a BBK. I know you will find the Prospeed kit to be the absolute best value out there.

If there is anyone interested, I will be happy to sell my entire inventory of parts for the F Body BBK. I don't care if it's a shop/tuner or someone from this forum that wants to facilitate a group purchase. With the inventory, I will provide all the Porsche part numbers, the Porsche PET 6 (cd parts catalog) the CAD drawing of all the parts (so anyone may manufacture more parts when these are gone) and the source data to order the Porsche parts directly from POrsche at a huge discount and be part of the plan whereby Porsche will drop ship directly to you with no freight charges.

Feel free to give me a call or e-mail with any questions or to discuss further.

Michael

mitchntx

iTrader: (14)

And I would suggest a ZO6 C5 kit from LG Motorsports for $800. 2 piston pressure cast and reinforced calipers, 13" rotors and a wide variety of pads, rotors and pads available at ANY Autozone or GM dealer. With the Porsche/Wilwood/BAER, it's not quite as easily found.

Look at more than the initial costs associated with these kits. At some point in time, you will need pads and rotors.$50 rotors and $60 pads is a far cry from $300 rotors and $350 pads.

Make sure you guys read all the fine print ...

Prospeed Motorsport

Mitch does raise a good point. The BBKs based upon a fixed 4 (or more) piston caliper are more expensive to purchase and more expensive to purchase consumable for.

That said, the C5 ZO6 is not really in the same league as the other kits. It is a floating caliper as opposed to a rigid fixed caliper. Floating calipers are notorious for mushy pedal feel. The weigh more than the Porsche calipers (more unsprung weight), flex more and do not have the thermal capacity (and if I recall piston sizes correctly, the ZO6 has less clamping force than the Porsche or Alcon caliper.) This has been gone over and over on a number of the other forums. Guys that had the ZO6 kit and were warping rotors, burning up pads and boiling brake fluid changed to the Prospeed/Movit kit and have had absolutely no further issues with any of the above.

The truth about BBKs is they don't stop you in any shorter distance than the stock system on the first stop. What the BBKS bring to the party is consistent stopping distances when you have been on the track for 20-30 minutes, going from 150 down to 30 every 60 seconds (or less) On the track you are never off the brakes, constantly using them and they never get the chance to cool completely. That is where the BIG difference is. The guys running the ZO6 system (I forget the exact series) on the Vettes are having serious cooling issues and go through pad faster than kleenex.

If you simply are looking for something that looks better than the stock brakes, then the ZO6 upgrade is reasonable. If you are tracking the car and finding you are running out of brakes after a few laps, you need a bigger brake system that has more mass, i.e. greater thermal capacity.

There is a point where going faster is simply a product of investing more $$. Whether it be in a better suspension, modified engine, stickier tires, track time or what most guys seem to not do, serious track driving lessons, it simply takes more $$ IMHO, the Prospeed kit is the biggest bang for the buck when it comes to BBKs. Dollar for dollar and as a system, it has greater thermal capacity than any of the other kits.

Prospeed Motorsport

Mitch does raise a good point. The BBKs based upon a fixed 4 (or more) piston caliper are more expensive to purchase and more expensive to purchase consumable for.

That said, the C5 ZO6 is not really in the same league as the other kits. It is a floating caliper as opposed to a rigid fixed caliper. Floating calipers are notorious for mushy pedal feel. The weigh more than the Porsche calipers (more unsprung weight), flex more and do not have the thermal capacity (and if I recall piston sizes correctly, the ZO6 has less clamping force than the Porsche or Alcon caliper.) This has been gone over and over on a number of the other forums. Guys that had the ZO6 kit and were warping rotors, burning up pads and boiling brake fluid changed to the Prospeed/Movit kit and have had absolutely no further issues with any of the above.

The truth about BBKs is they don't stop you in any shorter distance than the stock system on the first stop. What the BBKS bring to the party is consistent stopping distances when you have been on the track for 20-30 minutes, going from 150 down to 30 every 60 seconds (or less) On the track you are never off the brakes, constantly using them and they never get the chance to cool completely. That is where the BIG difference is. The guys running the ZO6 system (I forget the exact series) on the Vettes are having serious cooling issues and go through pad faster than kleenex.

If you simply are looking for something that looks better than the stock brakes, then the ZO6 upgrade is reasonable. If you are tracking the car and finding you are running out of brakes after a few laps, you need a bigger brake system that has more mass, i.e. greater thermal capacity.

There is a point where going faster is simply a product of investing more $$. Whether it be in a better suspension, modified engine, stickier tires, track time or what most guys seem to not do, serious track driving lessons, it simply takes more $$ IMHO, the Prospeed kit is the biggest bang for the buck when it comes to BBKs. Dollar for dollar and as a system, it has greater thermal capacity than any of the other kits.

ibjamin

iTrader: (6)

Mitch is right except for the $60 pads part. For stock street pads maybe (although I recall '02 Z06 pads were $90), but C5 race pads (hawk blues, HT-10, PF 01's, 93's, etc) are still $150 to $225 a set.

Michael, one change you need to make to your chart. The Wilwood system has a 1.1" (28mm) wide rotor, not a 1.25" (32mm) rotor.

George E. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="gr_grin.gif" />

steve_c

I have been to an open track session (full day).. and with constant 120mph stops, the brakes stood up time after time.

I'm talking a 300mile track day with absolutely no fade, and tremendous speeds.

Porsche brakes are serious stuff.

Steve