Project 350Z; the price for the big brake kit isn't a typo is it?

I was reading the 350Z project brake installation and being the cheap ass that I am, nearly fainted when I saw the price $7800! I needed to breath into a paper bag. Yes I know proper stuff cost proper money but I've lived in the land of cheap for so long I'm continually surprised but what things actually cost. My first thought was please tell me that's a typo but since GRM has it's act together my next thought was no it's not.....the article did say cry now.

Thankfully GRM soothed my nerves by featuring a cheap track hound SVT Contour on the inside back cover and I was able to breath again.

(Pssst I'm lying............please tell me that's a typo)

It's not a typo. GRM is a broad spectrum, not a single income bracket, which is why some projects (like the 350Z) get top-shelf parts, while others (like the V6 Miata or the Fox) get more budget-oriented options or suffer through endurance racing with stock VW brakes. At the end of the day our goal is to try everything and share our experiences so you can choose the right parts for your car.

By installing, using, and experiencing parts from a wide range of budget levels, we're better able to write about our experiences with all of them. Stock Miata brakes would seem like the best thing ever if you've never driven one with a set of Wilwoods, while it's tough to tell how good Wilwood kits are if you've never installed a kit like what I used on the 350Z.

Made me look - Stoptechs. Not the budget choice, but I have to admit that's a little further north on the price list than I expected as well. I would have expected AP Racing Radi-CAL calipers with that crazy asymmetrical evolved design at that price point. That stings. I'd hate to think of the reaction of our market if we tried to introduce a brake kit at 50% of that amount - it's the reason we don't offer a kit with the Radi-CALs even though it's the only product to literally stop me in my tracks at SEMA.

I have always been a little leery of Stoptech's claim that proportioning valves are not required with their kits. That sounds a bit like the brake equivalent of a bias bar or staggered master cylinders, a fixed front/rear ratio that is perfect only under one condition. They even host their own white paper on their own website that contradicts this claim.

Perfect brake bias is obtained when the front-to-rear balance of the brake system exactly matches the front-to-rear weight balance of the vehicle. Looking at our typical brake system chart, we see how difficult this is to do. However, if we’re trying to optimize a brake system for a particular deceleration level, it becomes much easier. We can tune the system so that the two lines cross (or come close to it) at the deceleration level the vehicle will be operating at most often. This is easy for a non-aero racing vehicle which typically operates at one fixed deceleration level. For a street car, this is almost impossible to achieve, because a car driven on the street doesn’t always operate at one deceleration level (if yours does, you probably don’t get too many repeat passengers!).

Yeah, I'm reserving my full judgement until I get the car back out on track on slicks. Hopefully that will be this weekend, but I don't want to get too far ahead of the stories here . During the installation it was obvious that these were much nicer than the cheaper big brake kits I've installed.... but I'm not sure they're worth the $7800 price tag, either. It was pretty impressive to upsize the brakes so much without adding weight, though.

It's not that out of touch when you look at what the factory Brembo setup runs to buy new or slightly used online. The retrofit kits run ~4.5K give or take for all four corners. 

In reply to Tom Suddard :

Tom please don't misunderstand, this post was me making fun of how out of touch I am.

I originally subscribed to GRM because it came with CM and I will be renewing my subscription because of the very fact that you cover the whole spectrum from challenge cars to wazoo fast no expense spared time attack cars. 

I also like the fact that you actually publish the cost of this stuff; I've seen so many magazines over the years that do builds but conveniently leave out the cost of things. One cannot make informed decisions without knowing what something costs. As a Purchasing Analyst I find it an egregious error to not talk about the cost.

At my fabricators shop we refer to the "E36 M3 to worth ratio" read how much pain (ease of install x dollars) versus what you gain (lower lap times, reliability, convenience etc). You explained the pain to value ratio well.

wearymicrobe said:

It's not that out of touch when you look at what the factory Brembo setup runs to buy new or slightly used online. The retrofit kits run ~4.5K give or take for all four corners. 

Yeah, as somebody who's played with mostly small cars up until this project, it's easy to forget that this car is a different scale than a Miata. There's a lot more weight and tire to manage, so every part seems to be bigger and more expensive.

Tom Suddard said:

Yeah, as somebody who's played with mostly small cars up until this project, it's easy to forget that this car is a different scale than a Miata. There's a lot more weight and tire to manage, so every part seems to be bigger and more expensive.

The article definitely reaffirms my single seater leanings and my general prejudice about track cars weighing much more than 2200lbs.

Despite having no real interest in the 350Z or the Vette project I read every word of every article as I find both interesting.

For that price you really start to wonder if there is another performance car you can get the brake system from and somehow craft it to your own vehicle. I mean, how much are used brakes off of a Porsche or Ferrari?

Vajingo said:

For that price you really start to wonder if there is another performance car you can get the brake system from and somehow craft it to your own vehicle. I mean, how much are used brakes off of a Porsche or Ferrari?

It depends on the car in question.  Some cars have easy / cheap upgrades available before you step up to the level of really nice $$$$ brakes.  Others, not so much, so you have stock and $$$$ with not much in between. 

In reply to Vajingo :

It's a cool idea, but finding cars with OEM 14" rotors in the junkyard is pretty rare, and their brake systems aren't cheap even used. That's before you do the machining and math to match them to the car.

That said, I've always wanted to do this, so I'm Bridgeport mill shopping. Maybe next time I can try the homebrew route.

And to give everybody an idea of the scale of these brakes/the 350Z in general, here's the front brake package against a 15x7 Miata wheel:

Vajingo said:

For that price you really start to wonder if there is another performance car you can get the brake system from and somehow craft it to your own vehicle. I mean, how much are used brakes off of a Porsche or Ferrari?

~$800 for some well used calipers.  Plus a couple hundred for pads, many hundred for rotors, + brackets, time to design the system, etc.  And even so, those still may be undersized for this application if they came off a Boxster or something.

Its always easy to look in a parts catalog or something and say "I can make my own kit cheaper", but you are paying for the engineering & testing as well as the manufacturing of brackets.  And for many on GRM, DIY is the way to go, some people just want to get back out on track, not spend weeks testing, measuring, fabricating, etc.

What you suggested does often work on cheaper cars though, where logical steps up can be found via parts bin swapping & junkyarding.  CTS-V Brembos are or used to be cheap donors for brake kits, as are Z32 calipers.

I haven't read the article yet (way behind on reading my print GRMs) -- is it $7800 just for the fronts, or for both axles?

In reply to codrus (Forum Supporter) :

All 4 corners

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/project-cars/LS-Swapped-2003-Nissan-350z/project-lsz-big-brakes-and-adjustable-suspension-p/

Here's the article for those that haven't read it. 

In reply to Tom Suddard :

You gave a me a good laugh with that picture............my Datsun runs 13" wheels and the rotors aren't much smaller than the wheel and tire on the F500. Picture says a thousand words. 

As for coming up with a kit; one of my single seat cars pulled 3Gs on the brakes, the whole set up was custom, while the Wilwood calipers were only around $600 total, all four uprights needed to be machined as well as custom carriers & spindles. There was easily 80 hours of machine work in them. My fabricator did the work to showcase his shop so I didn't have to pay for anything other than parts.

I have a picture of my 10" Mini wheels up against a set of NA Miata wheels, it's pretty funny as well. That Mini runs the cutest little brake setup with 7.9" rotors and tiny four pot calipers - light weight and low horsepower means a very different set of equations.

I've been tempted to build a brake kit for the Targa Miata around the AP Radi-CAL calipers, but the cost had me stalled. Maybe I'll put my big boy pants on and see what a setup a few steps up the ladder can really do.

Those are about the size I used on my ACR same supplier. 

Again perspective.

OEM +15 NA Miata Tire. Vs Front RIm on my ACR that was using the same brakes. 

OK, yeah, $4K per end is a fairly standard price for a premium BBK on most cars out there.

As for amusing size comparisons, here's one of the stock rotors off my Audi (2016 S6) compared to what's basically the biggest aftermarket rotor you can fit on a Miata (11.75").  The 400mm Audi rotor is monstrous.

Tom1200 said:

In reply to Tom Suddard :

I also like the fact that you actually publish the cost of this stuff; I've seen so many magazines over the years that do builds but conveniently leave out the cost of things. One cannot make informed decisions without knowing what something costs. As a Purchasing Analyst I find it an egregious error to not talk about the cost.

I'd like to just quote this because it's the darned truth.   I'm unfortunately well into the "I need to buy it working off the shelf, because fabricobbling time isn't a luxury I really have" camp, as much as I'd enjoy it.   I'm always really happy to have a realistic idea of what it would cost.   I've thought about upgrading my track Miata in a lot of different ways, but articles like this make me appreciate that for my $$$ and time budget, it's still the right fit.  On the other hand, the work with 9 lives racing last year made me realize that I could swing an aero package that I thought I couldn't afford.  Other 'zines conveniently leave out that their "beater track cars" cost 50k.

tl;dr - +1

codrus (Forum Supporter) said:

OK, yeah, $4K per end is a fairly standard price for a premium BBK on most cars out there.

As for amusing size comparisons, here's one of the stock rotors off my Audi (2016 S6) compared to what's basically the biggest aftermarket rotor you can fit on a Miata (11.75").  The 400mm Audi rotor is monstrous.

Good lord, just slowing that monster down on its own would generate a significant amount of heat.

Was the brake kit free or at special pricing for the magazine project, or did you pay retail cost the rest of us would have to pay?

Keith Tanner said:

codrus (Forum Supporter) said:

As for amusing size comparisons, here's one of the stock rotors off my Audi (2016 S6) compared to what's basically the biggest aftermarket rotor you can fit on a Miata (11.75").  The 400mm Audi rotor is monstrous.

 

Good lord, just slowing that monster down on its own would generate a significant amount of heat.

It has enough thermal capacity to do an entire track day with zero cooling!

ProDarwin said:

Keith Tanner said:

codrus (Forum Supporter) said:

As for amusing size comparisons, here's one of the stock rotors off my Audi (2016 S6) compared to what's basically the biggest aftermarket rotor you can fit on a Miata (11.75").  The 400mm Audi rotor is monstrous.

 

Good lord, just slowing that monster down on its own would generate a significant amount of heat.

It has enough thermal capacity to do an entire track day with zero cooling!

Hah!  The car weighs 4500 lbs and makes 450 hp -- pretty sure that even those monsters would be destroyed after a day at Laguna. :)