348 upgrade brake disc?

Speciale lip- Waiting for a call back on this, may take a while, Speciale books are harder to find. I'll post as soon as I get the price.

What brand brake discs do you want? Brembo?

Let me know and I'll have some prices for you.

Regards,
Kevin

 

Get slotted brakes, not cross drilled, these guys are excellent & a lot cheaper than F. Ive used them for years

http://www.porterfield-brakes.com

 

stillen makes rotors also

 

www.stillen.com Brembo drilled sport rotors and metal matrix pads.Used them on my 90 348ts and now on my F355 Spider.Great upgrade for the money.

 

The rotors on there are not Brembo to my knowledge, they are Stillen, unless they are just renamed Brembo's. Metal matrix pads are very nice though, I have a set on one of my cars albeit it's not a 348.

Also just my personal recommendation but I really recommend not getting drilled, but slotted just as William recommended.

 

Tire Rack has Brembo rear rotors on sale for $89.

 

Is this true? I just ordered the pair of Brembo rears from Tire Rack. I believe they are an OEM type replacement, no slots no holes.

 

yup, stock brembo rotors 89.00 tiresrack - 3-4wks delivery. get em while theyre hot.. no pun intended..

 

If you are going to do brakes, you may as well do some bigger Brembo's. My car has F40/F50 set up. The stopping power is nothing short of amazing. My car is about 250 pounds lighter than stock so I have no problem keeping up with 355s and 360s on the straights, and when we are approaching a braking zone, I pull out of their slipstream and fly past them when they brake as I easily have 200-300 feet before I have to brake as compared to them. Spend the $$, you will love the performance....unless you only use the car for P.P.E. (Posing, Parking, Eating)

 

Um, how exactly does bigger rotors cause your car to stop faster (in a shorter distance)?

 

The set up I have includes bigger Brembo calipers from the F40 and F50.

To answer your question....bigger calipers with bigger and more pistons house bigger pads...this inturn is used with bigger rotors.....more surface area+more powerful calipers = shorter stopping distances, with more heat dissipation and less fade

 

Sure, you might be able to get less fade, but that's only if you're suffering from fade in the first place. And a 348 is NOT suffering fromfade on the street - there is no way to drive fast enough on the street to get fade, without being either crazy or incompetent. Even on the track, the 348/355 brake setup is pretty darn good. Experienced drivers generally do not experience brake fade in a stock set-up car on the track, if they have good fresh brake fluid and proper pads.

Upgraded rotors are expensive, heavy and do NOT shorten braking distances.

This is all too common MYTH.

Why?

The point to make, over and over and over again to students I instruct is that the TIRE is the single biggest limiting factor, bar none. Every vehicle sold today has sufficient braking power to lock up the tires. If your brakes can do that, then the limiting factor is the amount of grip at the tire/road interface. Which is why race cars stop so much better - they have much more grip.

Ricers go for the big brake packages because they look "cool" and they think that it will improve their braking distances. Let me ask this question - if your stock brakes are sufficient to generate enough braking force to lock up your tires, how do bigger rotors and calipers improve upon that?

What upgraded brakes CAN do is improve the ability of the system to ABSORB heat. After all, brakes are, at their core, a heat transfer mechanism - it converts momentum energy into heat energy, then must dissipate it. Race cars have big brakes so that they can take the abuse of racing, lap after lap after lap. Stock brakes would be every bit as good for the FIRST lap, but would fail thereafter, if they are too small.

Ferrari 348/355 brakes are actually quite good. I've done thousands of laps in a street 355, and have never had fluid boil. Of course, your mileage may vary; a friend of mine in a 355 destroyed a set of pads in one weekend, simply because he's not a very good user of the brakes.

There's a very common misconception that upgrading brakes will automatically *reduce braking distances*. Nope. The car's ability to stop is a result of a variety of factors, the two biggest, by far, are the car's weight and the car's TIRES. A Ford Crown Victoria on racing slicks with stock brakes will outbrake the same car with giant brakes on street tires.

Heck, a Crown Vic with racing slicks and stock brakes will outbrake a Lotus Elise with giant brakes on snow tires!

Race cars have big brakes not because they're needed for the shortest possible braking distance, but rather to handle and dissipate heat and take the abuse of being used constantly. Take a 355 for example. With cold brakes, you'll get EQUAL braking distances with stock brakes versus big Challenge brakes or 8 piston Brembos (yes, you'll get different "bite" and "feel", but the distance will be the same).

After all, when you hit your brakes hard, you can lock up the tires (assuming no ABS). So the LIMIT isn't at the BRAKE, but rather at the TIRE.

If your brakes are strong enough to lock up the tires, then making your brakes bigger or upgrading them to ceramics will NOT decrease your stopping distance.

Analogy: you've got a weight suspended by a cable tied to a wire tied to a string tied to a rafter. No matter how strong you make the cable, or the wire, the total weight that can be supported is always going to be limited by the string.

Now, keep in mind, a less-skilled driver CAN easily cook brakes at the track. I've had students in even track-prepared cars boil fluid in just a handful of laps, simply because they're using the brakes incorrectly - braking too early, braking too long/extending the braking zone, failing to let the brakes cool, riding the brakes all the way to the apex, etc.

If anyone really is looking to improve braking performance, the best bang-for-the-buck way to do it is in this order (aside from learning how to drive):

1. Tires.
2. Better (fresh) fluid.
3. Better pads
4. Increased ducting.
5. Then and only then, upgrading the hardware.

vty,

--Dennis

 

Proof that the Brembo front brake kit makes a difference on a 348. Measured over three stops average on a level, newly repaved asphalt road.

Car setup is 225/40/18 BFGoodrich KD-TA's front and 275/40/18 BFGoodrich KD-TA's rear, ATE Super Blue fluid.

Stock 348 Brake setup w/ Hawk HP Plus pads.
60-0 117 feet

45 minutes later after changing rotors, calipers, and bleeding fluid

Brembo front 332mm kit stock 348 rears both with Hawk HP Plus pads
60-0 101 feet

I think it would be shorter yet with wider tires in the front but all I can fit on are 225's at the moment but am going to move to 235 Pilot Cups or Yokos for this season when I burn out this set. Different compounds would obviously make a difference here as well...but the blind statement that brakes dont matter is BS. When part of a well put together setup they do matter.

The biggest difference I notice in the brakes is that I can get ABS to come on consistently if I just mash the pedal this never happened before with the stock setup. The new setup is also a whopping 2lbs lighter per side mainly due to the aluminium hat.

If your bored and have time read a good deal of info here about brakes and how the magic all works. http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/tech_white_papers.shtml

As an FYI the 348 doesnt really behave any better with a big brake kit in the rear. I borrowed a friends setup and performed the same 60-0 test above and netted no gain in distance with the rear big brake kit installed. Beyond being a pain to remove the parking brake it didnt benefit me at all...now I am sure in the long run on the track they would vent heat better but for me its not worth the almost 4k at this moment to buy them.

Ronr dont worry about losing your parking brake that is only for hte big brake upgrade. You just got the stock Brembo setup Ferrari used from the factory.

And Oh by the way my tirerack shipment arrived yesterday

 

Big Head:

Could this have denegrated to a more worthless airing of 'experience and knowledge'? I doubt it.

I have been racing for years. It shouldn't take 3 pages of info to say what you are trying to say.

The 348 stock set up is good. I never experienced fade on the road or track with them. But the fact remains that with my current F40/50 set up the stopping distances are dramatically reduced as noted in running against well driven 355s and 360s at the track. The current set up outbrakes them by 100s of feet...with street tires. The differences grow when I use slicks.

You can quote all the items and knowledge you want........but the fact are the facts.....and if you think that bigger brakes don't improve braking distances, reduce fade, etc., then you need to get the text book out again.

 

Facts are indeed facts. I'll try to keep this simple for everyone.

A. You're driving at X mph in your 348. You've got stock brakes. You hit the brakes, and you hit the brakes hard. Your tires are at the limit of the traction they provide; as their slip increases, the ABS activates, cycling hundreds of times, to keep the tires rotating at the very limit of traction. You come to a complete stop.

B. You're driving at X mph in your 348. You've got massive, massive rotors that just fill the wheel now. You hit the brakes, and you hit the brakes hard. Your tires are at the limit of the traction they provide; as their slip increases, the ABS activates, cycling hundreds of times, to keep the tires rotating at the very limit of traction. You come to a complete stop.

C. You're driving at X mph in your 348. You've now installed tiny little Hyundai rotors. You hit the brakes, and you hit the brakes hard. Your tires are at the limit of the traction they provide; as their slip increases, the ABS activates, cycling hundreds of times, to keep the tires rotating at the very limit of traction. You come to a complete stop.

The stopping distance each time is EXACTLY the same.

Why? Because the LIMIT is not how much grip the ROTOR can provide, but rather how much the TIRE can provide. So long as the caliper and rotor can provide enough grip to lock up the tire, INCREASING the size of the rotor (and/or caliper) does NOT somehow magically increase the amount of grip the tire can produce.

If anyone still believes otherwise, can you please just take a couple of minutes to bother explain to us HOW bigger rotors can improve stopping distances?

Now, of course, having bigger/better brakes does, as I noted, help matters if you're pumping enough heat into the system to matter, but for street use, it's useless - you simply don't heat up the brakes enough on a 348 in any non-insane street use.

vty,

--Dennis

 

You guys get way to complicated, by the Bremos.

 

Dennis your statements are correct...my only problem with it is that my 348 isnt riding on bicycle tires. Your statement of "Bigger brakes dont make a difference" applies only in the case that tires are the limiting factor which in most cases is completely untrue on a car like a Ferrari.

I have hard proof that it makes a difference with a set of tires that you can buy and run legally on the street that are close to what almost all Ferrari owners run on their car.

There is also a difference in how the ABS system works with different sets of calipers and rotors any the different manners in which they apply torque to stop the car. Also pads make a difference in how much they deflect and compress and heat up inside of one stop.

Bottom line I think Ingenere and I can both speak from experience that the larger brake setups do work as the tires on most Ferraris are not the limiting factor in stopping. If you wish for more proof I am happy to repeat the experiement I did above this summer and video tape it for ya.

 

Here's the magic behind your test results - "The biggest difference I notice in the brakes is that I can get ABS to come on consistently if I just mash the pedal this never happened before with the stock setup."

With all due respect, that's why, I think, you might have some noticeable difference in test distances. Your stock setup SHOULD trigger the ABS *immediately*. If the ABS is triggered, that means that the tires aren't reaching incipient lockup as quickly, which means either there's a problem with your stock setup, or else you simply weren't hitting the pedal hard enough. ANY stock brake system on any car sold in this country in the last decade or two is MORE than capable of locking up the tires IMMEDIATELY, if the driver applies enough pressure.

BTW, the Stoptech series of articles you quoted to me? I love them. I quote them all the time (see the archives for more posts regarding brakes). If one cares to read them, they are not only very informative, they also take great care to dispel commonly held myths. E.g., why rotors are almost never "warped." Or, some favorites:

http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/wp_brakesystems_upgradeselections.shtml

"The brakes don't stop the vehicle - the tires do. The brakes slow the rotation of the wheels and tires. This means that braking distance measured on a single stop from a highway legal speed or higher is almost totally dependent upon the stopping ability of the tires in use."

"In order to brake effectively, the tires must comply with and grip on the road. Your braking system is no better than your tires and suspension. The best money that you can spend is on really good tires and really good shocks."

http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/wp_rearbrake_upgrades.shtml

"Contrary to popular belief, the real reason sports- and racing cars use big brakes is to deal with heat. Period. There has been a bunch of stuff published which will disclaim this, but when you look at the braking system from a design standpoint, making them 'bigger' doesn't fundamentally do anything for stopping distance. It's all about the heat. "

And if anyone has the time to devote to a "textbook" study of big brake kits, and how just bolting on bigger brakes can HURT performance, check this out:

http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/wp_abs_bigbrakekits.shtml

vty,

--Dennis

 

John, sincerely, I'm glad that you're happy with the brake upgrade. With all due respect, I'll have to quibble a bit with your methodology. Your testing technique are far from scientific (e.g., double blind), but, then again, for just our purposes, a more "real-world" test method like yours would be ok, except for the problem I noted in the prior post.

As for the tires that you and I run on our Ferraris.... I've run a gamut of tires, from old, granite Bridgestone Expedia S-01s, to modern Pilot Sport 2s to full racing slicks, on a 348, a 355 and a 355 CH. In each case, I've been able to lock up the tires (or trigger ABS) *instantly*, with the application of enough brake pressure.

Take another look at the stoptech articles. Brake systems are set up with the primary purpose of deliverying overwhelming pressure at the calipers. Even with the stickiest tires known to man, a stock brake system on a 348/355 will lock up the tires. It's just a question of the driver applying enough pressure at the pedal to cause it.

Which is the issue that I pointed out with your testing. If you, as you state, felt that your stock system didn't apply sufficient pressure to lock up your tires immediately, that means that either (a) there is something wrong with your system, or (b) [more likely] you simply weren't pressing hard enough.

It's simple enough for anyone on this board to test. Go out in your 355 or 348, whatever tires, on whatever road surface, at whatever speed. Hit the brakes hard. And I mean HARD. Now, it'll may be weird, for those of you without track experience (really, the single biggest problem that novices have at the track is that they have ZERO experience hitting the brakes really hard - everyone can mash the throttle, but no beginner really has experience in mashing the brakes), but I mean it - push the pedal through the floor. Apply that proper amount of pressure, and your ABS will trigger IMMEDIATELY.

vty,

--Dennis

 

Perhaps having more available braking power is similar to having more engine power. You will not always be using max power, but the more you have, the easier it is to use and modulate it. There's also a little more power available when you really need it.

Most people aren't used to slamming on their stock brakes with maximum leg force to get close to firing up the ABS. With more available braking power, you can apply a more gradually increasing force with moderate leg power. Seems to make things more controllable when getting close to the limit of tire friction.

 

Cannot find them ???
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Good analysis, but I'm not sure that your assumptions are correct - swapping out for a larger rotor would not necessarily increase the clamping force of the system. If all you're doing is putting a bigger rotor in, the caliper isn't grabbing any more of the surface area, so why would the clamping force have changed? But let's say that, for the sake of analysis, that you did increase the amount of clamping force by changing the rotor, or, more to the point, your goal was to reduce the amount of pedal pressure required to achieve a desired clamping force (which seems to be what you're saying).

There are other, better ways of achieving that goal (let's say for the sake of this discussion that this goal is an admirable one). One can spend $$$ on new, bigger rotors and/or calipers. On the one hand, having bigger rotors will help with fade, but if you're not racing the car (bigger rotors *can* help to prevent fade, which I acknowledged originally), you don't have that problem to begin with. On the other hand, however, you do have the problem of having just increased the weight of your car - and it's unsprung weight, which is worse. And, you've also increased the rotational inertia of the wheels, affecting steering and turn-in.

Whereas, if you, in furtherance of this goal, instead swap out the M/C and some other pieces for a lot less money, you've changed the amount of clamping force for a given amount of pedal pressure, for a lot less money, without the negative implications of having heavier rotors.

Ok, now for those who want to dig a bit "deeper" in the textbook, check this out.

"When a braking system is designed and installed, the components are chosen to provide a certain deceleration level for a certain amount of force applied by the driver to the brake pedal. While the overall relationship is critical, there are many ways to achieve the same end…but fundamentally the parts are chosen to work together as a system."

"One of the most important relationships for the ABS engineer is the pressure-torque (P-T) relationship of the caliper/pad/rotor assembly. In so many words, for a given brake fluid pressure, X, the caliper/pad/rotor assembly will build up a certain amount of torque, Y. For the sake of argument, let's assume that adding 100 PSI of brake pressure to the stock caliper in our example vehicle generates 100 ft-lb. of torque."

"Another important relationship is the pressure-volume (P-V) characteristic of the system. This relationship defines the swelling or expansion of the brake system for a given increase in pressure. Let's also say that our stock vehicle brake system 'swells' 1cc for every 100 PSI."

"Unfortunately, there are several big-brake systems available today which pay no regard to the original P-T or P-V relationships of the original vehicle…and in fact many make it a point to affect drastic changes in these relationships in order to give the consumer that feeling of 'increased bite.' While the upside is certainly a firmer pedal and higher partial-braking deceleration for the same pedal force, the trade-off can be ABS confusion."

Bottom line - big brakes CAN be great for your car, IF you have need of bigger brakes in the first place. For a 348/355, you do NOT need bigger rotors UNLESS you're doing a fair bit of track work or racing it. In which case, it may help with situations where you're pumping a lot of heat into the system, and help with fade resistance (though bigger calipers, titanium pistons, better pads, better fluid all do more in that regard), but it still won't help to decrease stopping distances. AND, if you do decide to get bigger rotors, please do make sure to upgrade the ENTIRE system, as needed, to make sure that your bigger rotors aren't negatively affecting your ABS brain or other parts of your braking system.

"So, will all big brake upgrades wreak havoc on the chassis control systems found on your favorite ride? Not necessarily. In fact, if designed and chosen properly, these upgrades can make the most of these control technologies while providing all of the cooling and thermal robustness advantages these kits have to offer.
The "secret" to brake system compatibility is that there is no secret - it just requires fundamental engineering expertise and design know-how.

As mentioned earlier, far too many of the big brake upgrade kits on the market today pay no attention to the P-T or P-V characteristics that the car originally possessed. In fact, there are kits available today which have P-T characteristics which more than double the output (P==>2T) of the stock systems they replace - "200% More Stopping Power" must be better than stock, right?

In most cases, these vendors procure large quantities of big rotors and red calipers, fabricate an adapter bracket to mount them to a variety of different suspensions, and market the kit as a 'one-size-fits-all' without first determining if the system will be compatible with the remaining foundation braking system, let alone the electronic chassis controls. Sure, it's quick, cost-effective, and looks like a million bucks through your 18" wheels, but what about ultimate performance?

The Solution
Unlike the "if it works on brand P, it must work on your car" approach, at STOPTECH all brake upgrade kits are designed with the characteristics of the original braking system taken into account to minimize these differences. This is the reason that when you order a STOPTECH big rotor upgrade kit the new caliper bores may actually be smaller than the units you are replacing to "balance the equation." This is just one way in which our engineers attempt to retain the original system's P-T and P-V integrity. Sure, it's not one-size-fits-all, but neither is your car…or your driving style. Why should you expect any less from your brake upgrade?
In closing, next time you think about bolting on those 16" rotors and 8-piston calipers remember that there are a number of chassis control systems out there just waiting to be confused. Select wisely and reap the benefits."

http://www.stoptech.com/tech_info/wp_abs_bigbrakekits.shtml

vty,

--Dennis