Hey guys, has anyone upgraded the brakes on the Mercedes??? I have a 560SEL and was wondering what could I do to creat better stoppping power and control. Any help would be great.
A few thoughts to consider about improving braking in order of importance. Start out reme...
A few thoughts to consider about improving braking in order of importance. Start out remembering that the MB already has world class brakes and that you have a two ton behemoth that you are riding.
First...use Sebastions suggestion about the stainless steel brake lines. Much of your backing power goes to expand the flex lines. Replacing these with braided flex hoses will give immediate results both in the feel and in the force applied to the calipers.
Second....Tires. The best calipers and rotors available are of no benefit if you can lock the tires. These will be your weak link. Here also check the proportioning.
Third...pad material. Really good pads will give better stopping for the force applied. Also, they will have material imbedded in the pads that help dissapate heat (i.e. copper). Downside is rapid pad wear and/or increased rotor wear.
Fourth....rotors. These only gain importance if "brake fade" is an issue. Fade is caused by heat build up and is really only a factor for repetitive breaking. I.e racing on a road course, going down mountains with a heavy load. I found vented cross drilled rotors to be the best for racing. Vented spiral grooved rotors for high perfomance street.
Fifth....calipers. Once you have tires with so much traction that you can not look up the tires (or get to the anti-lock stage) then you need more clamping force. Dual piston, double acting calipers will the way to go.
Remember also that the bulk of the breaking effort for our cars is on the front wheels. A combination of weight distribution, dive, and weight transfer can put 60 to 80 percent of the effort on the front wheels. Consequently, this is where the attention needs to be.
A reality of life is that you can spend gobs of money for little or no benefit. Unless you can no longer lock the tires or if break fade is a common issue.....well, better brakes become more cosmetic then truely benificial.
Litton
ex Maxda RX3 National SCCA B Sedan
'90 420 SEL
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Litton
'72 280 SEL 4.5
'90 420 SEL
'98 ML 320
'86 560 SL
Litton, That was very well written and I couldn't agree more. I have 400 hp in my SE...
Litton,
That was very well written and I couldn't agree more. I have 400 hp in my SEC and have no stopping related issues. Now if I took my car and tracked it I may have a few issues, but for the street the stock brakes are fine. No brakes are going to save you from a case of stupidity. The newer Mercedes with ESP does a wonderful job of keeping you out of trouble.
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