Brakes & Traction Bars

Post any Tech Tips or any matters and questions relating to upkeep
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marinerblueuk
Posts: 45
Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2012 7:44 pm

Brakes & Traction Bars

Post by marinerblueuk » Sat Feb 04, 2012 9:33 pm

I'd like to upgrade the brakes and am thinking of Dale's Resto's Wilwood kit so here are the questions
1. I might be changing wheels from 14 to 15 inch - how much difference would the 11.75 v 10.5 inch diameter discs make?
2. Anyone used the rear wheel disc kit? I know that it won't make much difference to the braking but having been used to ease of maintenance of discs would prefer them.
3. What's the effect of going to these in terms of pedal feel/travel? Will I need new master cylinder?
4. I'm thinking of 15X6 Minilites and 195/50 tyres. Will these fit without rubbing?
Thanks for any help and advice.

michael-king
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Location: Melbourne Australia
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Post by michael-king » Sun Feb 05, 2012 12:21 am

1. I might be changing wheels from 14 to 15 inch - how much difference would the 11.75 v 10.5 inch diameter discs make?
f you are going to go to 15" wheels you may as well get the larger disc setup as they do stop a little better and your new wheels will clear them.

2. Anyone used the rear wheel disc kit? I know that it won't make much difference to the braking but having been used to ease of maintenance of discs would prefer them.
I have the earlier rear dics setup dale offer (fiat based) they work well, he now uses mustang based dics i believe, owainllyod of stoc uses these and i believe is happy with them.

3. What's the effect of going to these in terms of pedal feel/travel? Will I need new master cylinder?
You are better off the change M/C to get a good pedal feel, are you using a servo? If not you can switch to a datsun 260z dual M/C setup, or subaru which is a little safer and gives a good pedal feel. The other option is to go to the early SII alpine M/C before they had a servo.

4. I'm thinking of 15X6 Minilites and 195/50 tyres. Will these fit without rubbing?
If you get the corret offset wheels they should be fine, but this will deend if your car is lowered, if you have any other mods. You may want to roll the lip on the arch a little just incase on the rear.. often the front valence can be a little close at the leading ege and can catch on lock so many people trim it a little.
.
Michael King
63 Alpine SII - 65 Alpine SIVGT
65 Tiger MKI - 66 Tiger MKIA
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marinerblueuk
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Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2012 7:44 pm

Post by marinerblueuk » Sun Feb 05, 2012 12:27 pm

Thanks! Just what I needed and a very prompt reply!
:D

Tomaselli
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Location: Cheshire, North West England

Post by Tomaselli » Sun Feb 05, 2012 6:02 pm

Great advice from Michael, and you are asking the right questions in improving braking performance. The standard offering are wholly inadequate and dangerous, I have the stock factory setup on a Tiger, and without a LSD, it's downright dangerous.

Looked into rear discs a while back and to be honest there is very little to be had unless you are looking to take the Tiger on a circuit and want to keep the brakes cooler. Discs are much better at keeping cool then drums.

Try the Brembo fronts as they are relatively cheap and easy to install, and with better pads (I run Pagid Blues) and rear drums correctly setup, you'll be fine for the road. I have that setup and my experience around the Nurburgring Nordschleife has been just fine.

With the money you save on the Dales brakes buy a LSD for the rear diff - now that should have been a standard offering from the factory :mrgreen:

marinerblueuk
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Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2012 7:44 pm

Post by marinerblueuk » Mon Feb 06, 2012 10:43 pm

LSD is on the list of things to do but I can't afford to do everything at once! I've been looking at the Quaife unit since I had a Quaife LSD on my previous car and was very impressed.
Another question though is about traction bars. I haven't had the car long enough to know whether wheel hop is an issue and opinions seem divided as to whether it's worth fitting them. It's going to be mainly a road car but I do intend to take it out for the occasional trackday too.

Tomaselli
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Location: Cheshire, North West England

Post by Tomaselli » Mon Feb 06, 2012 10:49 pm

Quaife LSD being a "torque bias" setup is a nice kit but you won't get any change out of £1k. Dana Powerlok seems to be a popular choice, also half the money and in a straight line it's fine but you will definately need to keep that "Axle Hopping" to a minimum 8)

tigerguy2
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Location: Chicago, USA

Traction bars?

Post by tigerguy2 » Tue Feb 07, 2012 4:31 am

My personal thoughts on yes or no...

Definitely avoid the weld-on traction bars. They tend to rip out of the chassis where welded-on. When leaf springs flex upward, they also elongate. That is why there is that swing shackle in back. The weld-on bars keep the axle from rotating (spring windup and resultant hop) but also prevent the spring from elongating. If it were not for the eyelet bushing in front of the spring and mounting bushings in the bar having some give, the bars would immediately rip out when the spring flexes upward. Even more likely to happen if you are running hard urethane bushings everywhere!

Bolt-on bars are much better because they do not have the above conflict, or at least it is minimized by the only snug, not tight clamp on the front part of the spring.

Much better control is obtained by a torque arm.

I myself am going to try a version of the Cal-trac control arm. There is a way to make your own. I had asked for help with this several months ago. Supposedly some of the guys that race Tigers in the UK use them, but apparently they do not participate in this forum as no help was forthcoming to my post for help. I had a brief promise of help from someone that uses them in the US, but they never followed through.

Anyway, if you are interested in having a go at it, have a look at this web site: www.hotrodsandhemis.com/Traction.html. The challenge for me was to figure out just how far from the pivot bolt to put the pressure bar that goes over the top of the spring. The Tiger essentially has two leafs immediately after the front eyelet instead of the one shown in the instructions. My initial attempt will be to put it about half way between the eyelet bolt and the front of the third leaf without interfering with the spacer button top that comes through the top of the second spring. Cannot find my mockup of that at the moment. Will share the dimension later if anyone is interested. Again, I have not yet implemented it. One of my Spring projects you see.

Cheers, Gene

Mal
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Post by Mal » Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:49 am

Gene, you can count me in on the interested list.
Cheers Mal.
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V8 burble
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Post by V8 burble » Tue Feb 07, 2012 1:09 pm

The Traction-Master Company, which made the LAT option traction bars, is still going strong in Burbank, California:

http://www.tractionmaster.com/index.html

TM offers improved versions of their original LAT-6 and LAT-5 traction bars for the Tiger.
The feedback from US Tiger owners seems to very much favour the bolt-on version.

TM quote:
Sunbeam Tigers were also factory-equipped with our original bars.
TM-505 (bolt on), previously LAT-6.

TM-9039 (weld on), previously LAT-5.

http://tractionmaster.com/app.html

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