BMW FRONT CALIPERS-you may be wrong Options

[Krieger]

I keep hearing this idea that BMW calipers add more heat vs stock caliper. I am not a physicist but any 2000 lb car going 60 mph with stock brakes is going to generate a certain amount of heat. Take the same exact car with smaller calipers (yes smaller) does it generate less heat? I don't think so. It is going to generate the same heat. The only thing that may change is the brake distance and time required to stop. Perhaps this extra couple of seconds it takes to stop allows more time to cool the brakes a tiny bit more, oh but your heating them longer. BMW calipers will add the same heat but faster. That is it. Other points are: the BMW rotors that these calipers were originally designed for are really close in diameter and thickness to our 914s. I'm sure someone will eventually post them. These BMW 320's were quite a bit heavier than our 914s as well. BMW used this combonation for 5 years it must have been a decent.

[alpha434]

Did you say that all in one breath? Joke.

It's a function of work/time. It only takes so much friction before the work done by the brakes defeats the work done by the tires and creates lockup. This is the maximum amount of work done before the brakes are useless. If your brakes are capable of doing this muchwork, then there is no need to upgrade. For a 914, the stock brakes are capable of locking the brakes, therefore there is no *NEED* to upgrade.

Reasons to upgrade the brakes.

1. You are aiming for a substantial unsprung weight reduction.

2. You go to wider tires, or something else that creates more fricton (operating at lower tire pressure, compounds etc)and can no longer lock the brakes at speed. (Need to do more work.)

3. Heat displacement. Larger brake bodies, or aluminum/ magnesium bodies offer the propensity to displace heat better. This is based on just a few variables. (More work= more friction= more heat.)

BMW brakes are an easy way to take advantage of points 1 and 3, but not 2. They aren't significantly larger to do more work. If they were, then it would be very easy to lockup the brakes, and would render the upgrade useless without a brake pressure adjusting unit.

These rules apply to ALL braking mechanisms, even my own be-all-end-all brakes. Someone get a link. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)