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Vented Front Discs Upgrade

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EVILCHIPPA
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2007 9:28 pm
Location: MELBOURNE

Vented Front Discs Upgrade

Post by EVILCHIPPA »

Don't know if this article has been done before but thought I'd give it a go.

This mod will work on ET AND EXA models and will make the brakes work over long periods of time without overheating them. I carried this mod out on my old ET with great success.

Firstly, go to a wreaking yard and purchase the early (84-86) Nissan Praire front hub assemblies with brake discs and calipers. You need the hubs as well as the brake discs and callipers (discs will be mounted to the hubs anyway).
Go to a brake specialist and order new brake discs and brake pads of your choice ( to suit the praire). If your up to it, get a caliper rebuild kit also.

Remove the entire steering knuckle off your ride. Take these and the Praire assemblies to the brake specialist and get them to fit the Praire hubs to your steering knuckles with the new discs fitted to them. You will probably need to replace the wheel bearings which I recommend doing.
Once they have done that, it's a matter of fitting them up to your ride, swapping the calipers over, fitting the new brake pads and bleeding the brake system. Make sure you get a wheel alignment also.
The front discs are slightly smaller in diametre than the standard ET or Exa discs, but are alot thicker and are vented so they will keep cooler and give a better pedal feel under hard and constant heavy braking. The brake pads themselves will also dictate how hard it brakes too.
Like I said, I did this conversion on my ET about 10 years ago and it improved the brakes out of sight. I was running Bendix Metal King pads front and rear with Dot 4 high temp brake fluid and didn't have brake fade once after that. Before I used to have alot of problems with my brakes overheating- especially when going down long hills with 4 people in the car.
The mod is very simple, but getting the hub and calipers off an old Nissan Praire may be difficult now as they are getting hard to find. Good luck to anyone who has a go.
DRIVE IT LIKE YOU STOLE IT.
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