AU1 brake upgrade

[13101093]

I have done some research on this site and others about upgrading the S1 brakes.

Do you really need to change over the control arms and swaybar? just to gain a different bolt pattern

or can you just get better calipers that will bolt straight on?

what is the best option?

[EvilChief]

nup needs changing ... as the tutorials / other threads say everything needs changing

[The Monty]

You can do the big upgrades from companies who supply them. Think they are around the $1400 for the fronts, and the same for the rears.

[private9]

There was also a premium brake option for series 1s, they do pop up for sale very occasionally. While this would be a straight fit up they are fairly rare.

[EvilChief]

the S1 have no bolton on points, instead a full floating bracked casted into the upright, that along will inhibit bigger rotors and calipers. What does this S1 premium package include?

[13101093]

cheers fellas looks like i will go for the full S2 upgrade as it will give me many more otpions and a better swaybar setup i believe. the tutorials on here are the go will print one off and give it a crack! i will source parts first though.

[FYRE_81_AUI_00]

hi, i was wondering if it is possible to go to a series 1 XR6/8 calipers, discs and pads as an upgrade option for series 1 rather than upgrading the front suspension to series 2/3? thanks

[JC]

Originally Posted by FYRE_81_AUI_00

hi, i was wondering if it is possible to go to a series 1 XR6/8 calipers, discs and pads as an upgrade option for series 1 rather than upgrading the front suspension to series 2/3? thanks

There is no difference in standard brakes for XR6/8 over the Forte (ie they are the same, and essentially are the same as EL brakes).

There are 3 choices for series 1 owners looking to upgrade:
1. Fit Tickford premium brakes (328mm rotors, twin spot callipers). rare, and pricey
2. Fit aftermarket brakes from Cebco, or race brakes. Not as rare, but still pricey.
3. Fit AU2/3 or BA suspension components and brakes (callipers & discs). Plenty around and costs should be in the $500 range.

[GK]

Lock in option 3 thanks Eddie!

GK

[The Monty]

In all honesty, a good set of pads and rotors will do the job admirably unless you are planning 20 laps of QR.

[13101093]

Still on the topic of series 1 brakes, mine feel very 'fady' as in slowing down for some lights, if i put a consistent pressure on the pedal and dont keep pushing it down, the car barely slows down and i do really need to keep pushing the pedal in to start slowing down at a reasonable rate, and i am talking about normal traffic braking here nothing extreme. Is this just the series 1 brakes becasue i have been in other AU's namely series 2/3 that require stuff all effort to slow down. or do i have some other problem

[FAT245]

ive been looking for an upgrade as well, my AU Fairlane needs to really have the pedal pushed. we found out that there is almost no pressure coming out of the Master Cylinder for the rears

[JC]

Originally Posted by 13101093

Still on the topic of series 1 brakes, mine feel very 'fady' as in slowing down for some lights, if i put a consistent pressure on the pedal and dont keep pushing it down, the car barely slows down and i do really need to keep pushing the pedal in to start slowing down at a reasonable rate, and i am talking about normal traffic braking here nothing extreme. Is this just the series 1 brakes becasue i have been in other AU's namely series 2/3 that require stuff all effort to slow down. or do i have some other problem

could be master cylinder issue. Could be calliper issue. I'd throw a rebuild kit at the front callipers first (around $20 per side), and if that doesn't help, then do rears, and still if no good then look at master cylinder. A decent set of pads and slotted rotors are a good upgrade for AU1s - the AU2/BA stuff is slightly better again.

[The Monty]

Id say you have other issues other than it being a S1 problem. I done the brake upgrade from Standard to DBA and Bendix pads, and from S1 - S2/3, and also S2/3 to BA.
I honestly could tell didly squat between them all EXCEPT brake fade going down the far side of Mount Glorious. I never had a problem with any upgrades and brake fade, just standard S1 gear. I had the brakes glow red, and then Warp undriveably when they cooled.

[Mr Hardware]

Originally Posted by The Monty

In all honesty, a good set of pads and rotors will do the job admirably unless you are planning 20 laps of QR.

This is what i found when I had my S1 - the worn stock discs and cheapo pads did a terrible job, but a brand new set of good quality discs and good quality brand name pads turned them into quite good brakes.

[GK]

My S1 wagon had woeful brakes. I upgraded them to dba slotted rotors and bendix pads on the front. Not much better.

I then went a S2 upgrade, (no upgrade to the master cylinder) with rda slotted rotors and QFM pads. Much, much better.

I prefer the bite and fee on my S2 SR sedan (which has the same rotor and pad combo), but I put that down to the S2 master cylinder and a bit less weight.

If I got another S1, I'd do the upgrade again for sure.

GK

[stavros68]

Got a fairlane sereis 1 V8 had pulsation problems and struggled to slow down changed to slotted with bendix ultima, were ok for a little while then same problem, done a full front conversion with BF XR8 callipers RDA slotted disks and original ford pads never had a problem again, conversion was a pain in the but as i had to drop the extractors to put the sway bar brackets bolts on the inner rails, if you've got a 6 much easier. Full conversion parts only cost me about $1100 with new bushes.

[adrian k]

Good slotted rotors and a decent set of pads plus a high quality dot 5.1 fluid and your S1 brakes will be much better. Remember these are the same as was on all E series falcons, and I know I am not the only one that thrashed them on the track.
I do remember i found a crowd on Melbourne that sold conversion kits, ie new uprights , brackets, calipers, discs etc, essentially ELGT spec. You had to send them your old upright with the ears in exchange.

[FYRE_81_AUI_00]

thanks for the help, guess i'll go with the series 2/3 conversion then

the XR8 calipers i saw were definitely twin pot front calipers, i think they were stamped PBR so i don't know if that is standard XR8 or not but they came off a series 1 XR8 which is why i was asking

[JC]

Originally Posted by FYRE_81_AUI_00

thanks for the help, guess i'll go with the series 2/3 conversion then

the XR8 calipers i saw were definitely twin pot front calipers, i think they were stamped PBR so i don't know if that is standard XR8 or not but they came off a series 1 XR8 which is why i was asking

They would either be the Tickford option, or an aftermarket upgrade. The fact they came off an XR8 is coincidence - they could've been fitted to any AU as an option.

[JaguarDave]

Originally Posted by 13101093

Still on the topic of series 1 brakes, mine feel very 'fady' as in slowing down for some lights, if i put a consistent pressure on the pedal and dont keep pushing it down, the car barely slows down and i do really need to keep pushing the pedal in to start slowing down at a reasonable rate, and i am talking about normal traffic braking here nothing extreme. Is this just the series 1 brakes becasue i have been in other AU's namely series 2/3 that require stuff all effort to slow down. or do i have some other problem

I had the same problem with my series two Fairlane's brakes when cold for the first stop. When cold I could jam my foot on as hard as possible and still not have the ABS kick in. Felt just like unbedded pads do when you try to use them hard first up.

After a few heavy stops they'd work quite well but if they were allowed to cool down again while driving on say a ten km country stretch without any use they were absolutely attrocious again.

I don't want to have to warm my brakes up so I got rid of the "premium" pads that were in it and put in some standard ones and the problem was gone, gone, gone. Now it has lovely brakes when cold.

As for the series ones, I say there's nothing at all wrong with series one brakes. My series one LTD's brakes work pretty much just as well as the series two fairlane's now that the pad material selection on both is in tune with my driving style. Properly set up series one brakes will pull a car up very quickly but pad and disc selection needs to match the manner in which the car is operated or shall we say "driving style".

The series two "upgrade" is a thicker disc to deal with heat and a slightly larger pad surface (which then required two smaller pistons to keep it flat on the disc) but it's not really a huge upgrade. Pad and disc selection will still be the biggest determinant of brake feel and performance.

This may sound silly but I've tried aftermarket ebay discs on both my AU's and dumped them for genuine Ford ones because I reckon the ford ones felt better under the foot and they bedded to the new pads much faster than my aftermarket ones too.

[13101093]

cheers for the information, its good that many people have tried different things and are willing to share can save other people lots of trouble! i did only go cheapo pads recently and unmachined stock disks becasue i had the upgrade to S2 in mind so that might be my biggest problem atm.

[adrian k]

it can be a compromise, stop when they cold and fall apart when hot or stop when they are hot but not when cold. Ferrodo DS2000 seem like a good compromise from all the pads i have tried over the years.

[private9]

Originally Posted by EvilChief

What does this S1 premium package include?

From memory twin piston calipers and around 325-330mm rotors.

EDIT - thanks to the encyclopedia of AU's (JC):
1. Fit Tickford premium brakes (328mm rotors, twin spot callipers). rare, and pricey

[Uncle_Ken]

Originally Posted by private9

From memory twin piston calipers and around 325-330mm rotors.

EDIT - thanks to the encyclopedia of AU's (JC):
1. Fit Tickford premium brakes (328mm rotors, twin spot callipers). rare, and pricey

But they look cool and stop great..

[JaguarDave]

Originally Posted by adrian k

it can be a compromise, stop when they cold and fall apart when hot or stop when they are hot but not when cold.

I think that's very true. In my case, living in the sticks where a hundred kmh road is just two right turns away, I want a pad that stops hard first time cold for when that kangarooster jumps in front of me unexpectedly. I probably won't use the brakes again for another ten kilometres so the brakes go cold again and high temp performance won't be critical and I rarely ever strike stop start traffic to warm them up. Even when going down say Fitzgerald's Mount I use the gears a bit to keep off the brakes except when really needed so I choose a standard type (but decent quality) pad that works great cold. Of course I grew up in the days of drums all round so I'm used to trying to stop brakes from getting hot and only using them when absolutely necessary.

Someone towing or operating in stop start traffic isn't going to need to make his first cold stop from 100kmh so he an get away with a bit less cold performance until his brakes warm up from the normal stop start which happens relatively quickly due to those harder conditions so he needs to choose a higher temp pad than I do.

My XJS club car needed a real high temp pad for the club's Conrod supersprints cos that first stop at the Chase would heat the supposedly high performance jag pad up so much that they wouldn't make Murray's corner without fading half way in let alone allow another hard stop from a full bore entry into Hell corner. On the other hand I used really soft pads for the esses hillclimbs because it only had to brake hard once so cold performance became most important again.

So yeah, it's all a compromise but one needs to select the right gear for the conditions and having tried heaps of different pads over the years in various cars I see huge differences between them in operation, specially now that asbestos has gone. Disc material seems to vary nowadays too.

[Papa Smurf]

I just finished my AU1 to BA brake upgrade today and it doesn't look half bad. Would like to have done this in a garage or a workshop with use of a hoist but beggars can't be choosers.

[EvilChief]

Originally Posted by private9

From memory twin piston calipers and around 325-330mm rotors.

EDIT - thanks to the encyclopedia of AU's (JC):
1. Fit Tickford premium brakes (328mm rotors, twin spot callipers). rare, and pricey

so it is the brake package that req the later uprights as well and is not a straight upgrade as asked by 131010... in post one and private9 mentioned its a straight swap ... it is not

[sleeper393]

i was lucky and picked up a complete bf front brake assembly of ebay for $56 , refubished the calipers new pistons seals the lot , got the calipers thermal coated , and the brackets zinc chromate plated as per factory all for $250 odd bucks on top of the purchase price , cheaper than what would have cost me if i had purchased from a wrecker, they were wanting around $450 for the complete setup, calipers, discs, hubs & uprights

[Boza]

Originally Posted by Papa Smurf

I just finished my AU1 to BA brake upgrade today and it doesn't look half bad. Would like to have done this in a garage or a workshop with use of a hoist but beggars can't be choosers.

Hey mate hows the pedal feel after the conversion have heard mixed reports of spongy pedal after conversion