brakes

[Sabo]

Hi
I have 110CSW 1986 with drum brakes on the back, can these be changed to disc brakes, tried CP components but he's now gone out of business.
Are disc brakes better? 
Any advice.
I'm thinking of vented discs for the front as well, need better breaking as a full vehicle slows down a lot slower, especially when one of my lads is now taller than me!

Dave
Nottingham

[TDi90]

hi dave.
personally i changed my rear axle to a range rover one but disco ones can be fitted too.
i only did it for offroading, because the drums kept filling up with mud!
hth
R

[crazymac]

I'm not positive on this so feel free to correct me? The 110 has a salsbury rear axle with Drums, so to stay legal ( I know its boring!) you would need to fit a salsbury Disc axle??

I have a mate who is talking about this, and he is quite  :-k :roll: about staying inside the law, specifically regarding being in an accident and an assessor looking at your vehicle and realising that you have the wrong axle!!

Personally I think he is worrying about nothing, but ???????

[Eeyore]

Your right about the Salisbury axle being fitted, but the Range Rover / 90 axles are no less strong. Sure the Salisbury has a four pin diff and tougher shafts, but on a permanent 4x4 system, both axles take the same torque, so the Salisbury was acutally pretty unecessary.

The quickest option for disking the rear would be to fit a later, 300tdi Salisbury axle, however these can seem to be quite pricey. A standard Rover type rear can be fitted and is cheaper, but you'll need a new prop, which will add to the cost. A Range Rover/Disco axle also has smaller calipers than the Defender, so they may need replacing too. Post '02 110 axles are the thing to have, but they are awesomely expensive! ....and you'll still need a new prop (grrrrr!).

As for vented disks on the front, I really wouldn't bother, unless you plan on doing a lot of towing in France. The unvented sort are lighter and work just as well, and they don't fill with mud!

[V8MoneyPit]

We have this conversation with Mini owners all the time at work. It all depends on what you mean by 'better brakes'.

If you stamp on the pedal with the existing setup, you should be able to lock the wheels. This as much braking 'power' as you can get. If you can't lock the wheels, there is something wrong with the brakes. Or you aren't pushing the pedal hard enough!

If you are finding that the brakes are overheating when in contant hard use, then fitting vented fronts and disc rears will improve this because they are better cooled.

If you wish to reduce pedal effort, a different ratio servo would be needed to achieve this. Or different piston sizes in the calipers to change the hydraulic ratio. Not sure if any of the options available will achieve this though. You might find later master cylinders are a different bore to 'lighten' the pedal, but again I'm not sure. Others may be able to advise.

[Tommo]

I wouldnt like to try it but i know that at 70mph theres no way my land rover would lock its wheels up, maybe the back a little if it was unladen.
and i consider the brakes to be in good condition. no problem locking them up at say 30mph.

I dont think most cars will? never really had to try it.

I had a fiat 126 and it would lock the wheels at below 30mph but anything above and you could press as hard as you like.

[Sabo]

Hi
Been reading and surfing, if I were to change back brakes I recon it's going to cost a lot, so thinking of uprating, found Powerbrake, they do a different type of pad and shoes and drilled/grooved discs - maybe an option.
Also not mentioned above, I have a full rollcage + larger tyre diameter MT's which don't help!
Keep on with advice and ideas.

Thanks in anticipation

Dave

[Eeyore]

Save your pennies and don't bother with drilled and grooved disks - they work on fast road and track cars, but for off-roaders, they really ain't worth the money. Your tyres will loose traction long before you can benefit from getting your pads shaved. Its the same issue with super-dooper brake pads too - you'll just exceed the braking grip from the tyres and go slide.

Also (whilst I'm on the subject) the grooves in the disks will gather dirt and abrade pads even more quickly.

Cheers
 
Eeyore

[Landy Andy]

I am also thinking of up rating my brakes, this is more due to them over heating during Alp decents on my Holidays.

I hear that EBC stuff is good????????

Andy

[Eeyore]

I wouldn't go for anything higher up the list than their green-stuff pads. which seem pretty good, but not a whole lot better than genuine standard pads.

[Range Rover Blues]

I'd agree, green stuff are good because they are easy to clean up after, but standard pads are far from rubbish.  On my LSE I've got EBC grovved disks and they are mint, but as he said above all they'll do off road is drag crud into the braking surface and render the brakes useless.

Good, clean, newish disks and EBC pads (given they cost the same as Ferodo pads ie £25 each end).

[Sabo]

Hi

Got a chance of a late 1994 disc rear sals axle from 200tdi.  Would the ratio be the same and would it drop straight in?
All being that the wife would let me have it!

Dave

[Eeyore]

The 200tdi is liable to have drum brakes. It was the subesquent 300tdi that had disks - howeverm these started production in 1994.

Worth checking before parting with your hard-earned.

But yeah, if it's Salsibury it'll just sway straight out with the old 'un.

[Range Rover Blues]

I think the reaosn the rar alxe is a Salisbury is that wheen fully loaded you are far more likely to wave a front wheel int he air than the back, also when loaded the amount of grip there will be much higher, so worst case scenario on a standard car is loads of grip at the back due to the weight, 2wd due to being cross axled with difflock then doing something stupid and 'pop' goes the axle.

They must have fitted them for a reason and it certainly wasn't cost.

As for vented disks, well the 110 had the same vented disk as RRC but as said bigger callipers which help reduce pedal effort (making up for the bigger tyres on the 110), AFAIK the callipers are interchangeable

One option would be keep you existing callipers if they are ok, then fit a spacer kit and vented disks.  Vented allow you to use slightly softer pads which will give you better braking, like EBS (who recomend vented sdisks with Green Stuff).

And if you drive the truck round unloaded then you probably have some braking capicity on the front that's unused, I'd expect the back end to lock up first :-k

[Eeyore]

They must have fitted them for a reason and it certainly wasn't cost.

Basically it boils down to history. Series vehicles had 'em fitted, but they ran in RWD most of the time, so the back axle took all the load. When they went for permanent 4wd, a thinner back axle was seen as a 'retrograde' step, and consequently the Salisbury was kept - despite the fact it offered mechanically little advantage and cost more.

Well, traditions are made to be broken, it just LR about 15 years to break this 'un!  :lol:

[Range Rover Blues]

Ah, then the large piles of spare Salisbury bits on MOD shelves might have been a deciding factor :-k

Don't military 130s have 2 salisbury axles like a 101?

[Eeyore]

Dunno about the 130s, but there were a number of coil-sprung 'heavy variants' that had Salisbury front axles, as well as the 101.