Impressions so far...let's put the btrakes on...

[ChimpOnGas]

Barreti said:

Do you have a 4.x or 5.0ltr car.
I thought I'd ask because not everyone knows the 4.x cars have smaller front brakes and its an easy upgrade to fit the 5.0ltr setup.

This really only relates to very early cars, from mid 1995 on all RV8 Wheeler TVRs had 260mm vented discs up front.

Fortunately the smaller brakes are actually very rare, but the calipers on the 260mm disc cars are still cast iron sliding single piston efforts which are very bottom of the pecking order when it comes to caliper design.

There's a reason TVR put proper four opposing piston ally AP calipers on the Cerbera and every single TVR that came after, if you complete the E38 Brembo upgrade the combination of bigger discs giving greater leverage and those bigger discs being squeezed by four piston calipers gives Cerbera levels of braking for £500 so investing in the mono piston boat anchor calipers seems pointless to me.

And there's a 300mm disc option that fits under 15" from wheels that gives 95% of the results you get from the full fat 324mm I have under my 16" front Imolas.

[Barreti]

My upgrade to 5.0Ltr rotors and calipers cost around £100 and I can lock up the front end easily.
They might not be as good as the Brembo upgrade, which does look a fantastic upgrade for the price, but my point was if you don't already have the later car spec brakes they are a very cheap option for a huge improvement.

[BJWoods]

ChimpOnGas said:

The standard brakes are indeed fine, but that most certainly doesn't mean they can't be massively improved on!

Better brakes enhance your confidence in any car and the pleasure it gives, and lets not kid ourselves here.... the brakes that come with even a work-a-day modern car are immeasurably better than what was going on much faster cars in the 1990s. While ABS is unquestionably the most significant development in automotive braking since the disc brake, the truth is unless you're driving everywhere like a complete twaaat ABS activations should be rare. ABS is there to save you, its a predominantly a safety feature not something to be used during normal or even moderately aggressive diving, if you're activating ABS regularly or even using it when pressing on... the simple fact is you need some proper driver training.

So for 99.9% of driving, modern car brakes aren't better because they have ABS, they're better because they are so much more powerful and offer better feel. Car manufacturers spend millions on brake development using teams of super skilled and qualified engineers to achieve their results. For these reasons you can't really compare the brakes on a 2018 car with a twenty year old TVR that borrowed it's brakes from an early 90s Ford.

The OP feels he'd like better brakes, so I'm not sure its all that helpful to respond by telling him he doesn't need them, I too was told I didn't need better brakes on my Chimaera which I chose to ignore because just like the OP, quite simply... er "I wanted better brakes"!.

I bought a set of used ally four piston Brembo GT calipers, while they were in good shape for complete peace of mind I had them reconditioned with new pistons and seals. These excellent calipers where used extensively by a number of car makers during the early 2000's including Ferrari who put them on the 360 and 612 models.

Fortunately the exact same caliper was also used on the E38 BMW 7 series to slow that 1.8 ton 155mph executive express, they made tens of thousands of E38 7 series BMs so it's easy to find these calipers on eBay for very reasonable money. By a happy twist of fate because the Griffith & Chimaera use a ford Sierra front upright you can use some neat laser cut brackets offered by Capri Sport for Sierra Cosworth enthusiasts looking for a cost effective brake upgrade.



https://caprisport.co.uk/p/cosworth-2-wheel-drive-...

The above is a tried and tested upgrade that uses inexpensive and readily available 325mm Mk1 Focus RS discs, quality pads for the Brembo caliper are also readily available from any decent motor factor, just order a set for a 3.0 Litre V8 or the big bad boy 5.0 litre V12 E38 because both models (and the E38 8 series) used this excellent Brembo caliper.

The above is an easy bolt on kit, you do however need 16" front wheels as used by TVR themselves on the last run of Griffs & Chimaera and a set of spacers but I was fortunate here too as the guy I bought my TVR from had fitted a pair of 16" rear Imolas to the front of my Chimaera. Fitting 16" front wheels to replace the standard 15s is a common mod, mostly it's done because it broadens your tyre choice but it also makes space for bigger brakes. If you struggle to find a pair of 16" Imolas or Estorils because they are getting rare and expensive these days you can always use the smaller disc & caliper kit from Capri Sport, and a few Chimaera owners have done just that.

The beauty of this conversion is you're not buying some track day caliper made by a small outfit on a industrial estate, you're buying into all the design and development skills of the largest most respected brake manufacturer in the world. Brembo calipers are OEM quality, they have to go through the most intense and punishing destruction testing you can imagine before the likes of BMW will put them on their cars.

Better still the consumables (discs & pads) are cheap and readily available, I pushed the boat out and bought Brembo pads and Brembo discs to complete the OEM package.

But the best thing about this conversion is you can do the whole thing for £500, compare this with any other brake upgrade offered for our cars and it's getting on for half price for what I would argue is a better result because you get OEM quality brakes with all the intense R&D that comes with it, Brembo vs HighSpec ect ... No Contest!.

Read how to complete this outstanding and cost effective Brembo/Big Disc brake upgrade on your TVR Chim/Griff here...

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

So yes, the standard brakes on our cars are fine, but if you want to take your TVR to the next level of braking my God this Brembo conversion gives fantastic results. You really need to experience the difference to understand the night and day difference between standard Chim/Griff brakes, but I can guarantee you it'll be the stand out best upgrade for £500 you'll make to your TVR, and by a massive margin too.

On the face of it braking sounds like a rather dull element of driving, the reality however couldn't be more different, when you upgrade brakes the pleasure and confidence they give is huge. So despite all the comments from the 'standard brakes are fine' brigade my experience says the OP is very much on the right track when he says he wants better brakes. Finally to put all this into perspective I drove my mate's Chimaera 500 recently which has well maintained standard brakes, yes they were fine, but compared with my Brembo caliper and 325mm disc set up, and because I'm now so used to them, the standard arrangement actually felt broken the first time I touched the brakes!

most people were saying. just check the brakes are functioning properly first.. Then an educated decision can be made.

Like someone saying I want more power.. need to check that you are getting the expected power, before you start modding.
Like someone saying I need to ugrade the suspension, - before checking basic geometry set up is correct, tyre pressures, etc.


just check everything is as should be, because if there is a problem, once sorted.
You may think yo do not need better brakes, or more power.

all these cars are old.

[jesfirth]

the 500's as standard had a brake bias that over brakes toward the rear which is one reason when they are less stable under hard braking. a front upgrade is a good idea to solve that but don't go too far for road use. all you are doing is increasing unsprung weight. When I took my cerb in for a brake upgrade to a well known indie race team he just asked me if I could lock the fronts under braking. when I said yes he suggested I did not change them. that meant he did not get the work so it was a very honest opinion.

[RichB]

ChimpOnGas said:

The standard brakes are indeed fine, but that most certainly doesn't mean they can't be massively improved on!

Better brakes enhance your confidence in any car and the pleasure it gives, and lets not kid ourselves here.... the brakes that come with even a work-a-day modern car are immeasurably better than what was going on much faster cars in the 1990s. <clip>

I agree with C-on-G here. I bought my Griff new 19 years ago when the fashion for upgrades, as someone put it, was current. I did the, then fashionable, stuff to the engine and also decided I wanted better brakes. With help from Neill Anderson at TVR, I fitted AP 4 pot calipers and 315mm discs. This was all documented in Steve Heath's book back in period but I've lost the notes now. With that said, I have to say every time I drive the Griff I say to myself how well the car goes and how well it stops. Cost me about £1,200 at the time but to me it was worthwhile, it changed the car noticeably.

[Classic Chim]

The bigger the disc surface area the more progressive the pedal feels, my old 500 brakes on my 450 were rear biased, lock up fronts easily and felt clumsy. My Brembo are exactly the same as in the pictures above and about 40% better at everything.
It’s not like I need F1 brakes but when danger appears by god am I glad I’ve got em!!!

Night and day, like pulling cables compared to Brembo.

[ChimpOnGas]

RichB said:

I agree with C-on-G here. I bought my Griff new 19 years ago when the fashion for upgrades, as someone put it, was current. I did the, then fashionable, stuff to the engine and also decided I wanted better brakes. With help from Neill Anderson at TVR, I fitted AP 4 pot calipers and 315mm discs. This was all documented in Steve Heath's book back in period but I've lost the notes now. With that said, I have to say every time I drive the Griff I say to myself how well the car goes and how well it stops. Cost me about £1,200 at the time but to me it was worthwhile, it changed the car noticeably.

Classic Chim said:

The bigger the disc surface area the more progressive the pedal feels, my old 500 brakes on my 450 were rear biased, lock up fronts easily and felt clumsy. My Brembo are exactly the same as in the pictures above and about 40% better at everything.
It’s not like I need F1 brakes but when danger appears by god am I glad I’ve got em!!!

Night and day, like pulling cables compared to Brembo.

It's all in the feel, balance... and the confidence they give!

The Brembo upgrade costs £500-£600, if you measure the 'money vs results' no other Chim/Griff upgrade even comes close.... it's the very definition of a 'No-Brainer'

I still love leaning on my Brembo anchors

[ou sont les biscuits]

ChimpOnGas said:

RichB said:

I agree with C-on-G here. I bought my Griff new 19 years ago when the fashion for upgrades, as someone put it, was current. I did the, then fashionable, stuff to the engine and also decided I wanted better brakes. With help from Neill Anderson at TVR, I fitted AP 4 pot calipers and 315mm discs. This was all documented in Steve Heath's book back in period but I've lost the notes now. With that said, I have to say every time I drive the Griff I say to myself how well the car goes and how well it stops. Cost me about £1,200 at the time but to me it was worthwhile, it changed the car noticeably.

Classic Chim said:

The bigger the disc surface area the more progressive the pedal feels, my old 500 brakes on my 450 were rear biased, lock up fronts easily and felt clumsy. My Brembo are exactly the same as in the pictures above and about 40% better at everything.
It’s not like I need F1 brakes but when danger appears by god am I glad I’ve got em!!!

Night and day, like pulling cables compared to Brembo.

It's all in the feel, balance... and the confidence they give!

The Brembo upgrade costs £500-£600, if you measure the 'money vs results' no other Chim/Griff upgrade even comes close.... it's the very definition of a 'No-Brainer'

I still love leaning on my Brembo anchors

It’s going to be a chunk more than that if you have to buy new rims and tyres though.....

[Classic Chim]

As with doing anything that seems like a bit of a shot in the dark I had a frown on my face for weeks after putting these Brembo brakes on, takes a lot to convince me but as they slowly bedded in I started noticing the fine cut lines and how the pad and disc heating up at the right rate gets the disc filled with small bits of brake pad material as they blend together, aboiut 1000 miles later as they barely have to work to stop the car I then started noticing very modern vehicles with similar sized discs and exactly the same cut lines on the discs. If it’s good enough for 70k Beemers and Audi on a car weighing half that,,,,,,,

It’s actually quite a thrill using them, as soon as they went on I noticed just how often we brake, all the bloody time so now it felt real good to be doing it I didn’t mind so much
I actually enjoy just pulling up to the lights very gently as the precise pedal feel is like these new cars I’ve mentioned, sort of perfect.
It’s pure luck that even though your pushing more pistons out the hydraulic system feels perfectly matched.
It’s by far pthe best mod that actually worked I’ve done and possibly the cheapest yet the classiest bit of the car.
Just walking towards the car and seeing those discs displaying the same wear pattern as super German cars sort of makes me laugh and does fill one with a base confidence that’s hard to beat. World class.
My cars a lot safer with these which is really the best bit.
Balance is another one, unsparing weight is marginal but the balance between front to rear is so much better and because the pedal feel is so accurate I can sort of dance on the tyres at lock up, I played being the ABS once in the rain,,, once you sense when they will lock up which is why they are better, you can feel it rather than it just happen and you react! No good to anyone!
I got used to doing all these brake tests and was literally able to feel the fronts ( under rotating) so ease up the pedal a few % and all’s good again so I pissed about locking and unlocking exactly like abs does,,, hilarious control. Awesome is the word.
I then put Rainsport tyres on, now your peeling yourself off the windscreen if you try that nonsense
I’m like Dave and more than happy with the road pads and discs that are all Brembo, some race pads and grooved or drilled discs and you’d stop great on track too but for road use these are matched up perfect. The 324mm discs being Ford Focus which isn’t a heavy car are well matched on our cars.
If we could do a load of tests on mods,,, this one would score high with any judge with half a brain imho

[ChimpOnGas]

ou sont les biscuits said:

ChimpOnGas said:

RichB said:

I agree with C-on-G here. I bought my Griff new 19 years ago when the fashion for upgrades, as someone put it, was current. I did the, then fashionable, stuff to the engine and also decided I wanted better brakes. With help from Neill Anderson at TVR, I fitted AP 4 pot calipers and 315mm discs. This was all documented in Steve Heath's book back in period but I've lost the notes now. With that said, I have to say every time I drive the Griff I say to myself how well the car goes and how well it stops. Cost me about £1,200 at the time but to me it was worthwhile, it changed the car noticeably.

Classic Chim said:

The bigger the disc surface area the more progressive the pedal feels, my old 500 brakes on my 450 were rear biased, lock up fronts easily and felt clumsy. My Brembo are exactly the same as in the pictures above and about 40% better at everything.
It’s not like I need F1 brakes but when danger appears by god am I glad I’ve got em!!!

Night and day, like pulling cables compared to Brembo.

It's all in the feel, balance... and the confidence they give!



The Brembo upgrade costs £500-£600, if you measure the 'money vs results' no other Chim/Griff upgrade even comes close.... it's the very definition of a 'No-Brainer'

I still love leaning on my Brembo anchors

It’s going to be a chunk more than that if you have to buy new rims and tyres though.....

No, just fit the 300mm disc version and they go under the 15" front wheels no problem at all.

Here's an interesting fact that proves TVR themselves were looking to improve the brakes on these cars in period, just last week I was at a local car show and there was a very late build Griffith on display that had unique TVR branded 5 stud 16" front wheels sitting over AP four pot brake calipers exactly as used on the Tuscan ect.

I asked the owner when he'd completed this brake upgrade and he simply replied.....

"I didn't, it came from the factory like that when the car was new"

It was a really interesting late model Griffith with many unique features not just the brakes, but the AP brakes clearly showed TVR themselves saw scope for improvement on the old cast iron Ford sliding calipers, and right up to the end of the Rover V8 TVR production the factory was still developing the car in many ways.

The Brembo brake conversion is a simple and inexpensive way to follow what TVR themselves were doing to improve the brakes on Chimaeras and Griffiths as these models were coming to the end of their production life, and once you've done it to your own TVR it'll all make perfect sense why.

These cars are flawed diamonds, in an elegantly simple old school way the fundamental blueprint of the vehicle is excellent, but there is most definitely significant scope for improvement. While I respect the 'Originality at All Costs' brigade, in my opinion the practice of polishing the flaws out of these cars is intrinsically wrapped up in the TVR ownership experience and only serves to strengthen the bond between man & machine.

[RichB]

ChimpOnGas said:

<clip> the AP brakes clearly showed TVR themselves saw scope for improvement on the old cast iron Ford sliding calipers <clip>

Indeed, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned Neill Anderson in my post below. Neill was the chassis engineer at TVR and after our conversations about fitting RL7 wheels and Tamora calipers to my Griff the factory went on to produce a 5 stud conversion for Griffs and Chimaeras. My car has specially made 4 stud wheels. Neill drove a test mule Griff 500 on which a lot of different stuff got tried and tested.

[ChimpOnGas]

RichB said:

ChimpOnGas said:

<clip> the AP brakes clearly showed TVR themselves saw scope for improvement on the old cast iron Ford sliding calipers <clip>

Indeed, that's what I was referring to when I mentioned Neill Anderson in my post below. Neill was the chassis engineer at TVR and after our conversations about fitting RL7 wheels and Tamora calipers to my Griff the factory went on to produce a 5 stud conversion for Griffs and Chimaeras. My car has specially made 4 stud wheels. Neill drove a test mule Griff 500 on which a lot of different stuff got tried and tested.

That's so cool

I love to read TVR development history like this, and I'm sure the Griffith owner I met the other week mentioned the name Neill Anderson when he talked me through his 5 stud wheels and AP caliper setup.

I'd love to meet Neill, I bet he could share a tale or two about those times and what he learned from all that development work.

Thanks for sharing

[RichB]

ChimpOnGas said:

That's so cool

It was good times. My first TVR was an S3c and I wrote to them (this was before email was popular) asking about the correct positions for the pressurised cap and non-pressurised cap on the swirl tank and expansion tank. I suspected mine had inadvertently been swapped around. One evening around 6pm my wife answered the phone and called me over to say it was TVR on the phone to chat to me about radiators and expansion tanks! How's that for service. Same happened when I started planning the brakes on the Griff, I wrote to the factory and soon Neill got me on the phone to offer his help.

[ChimpOnGas]

RichB said:

ChimpOnGas said:

That's so cool

It was good times. My first TVR was an S3c and I wrote to them (this was before email was popular) asking about the correct positions for the pressurised cap and non-pressurised cap on the swirl tank and expansion tank. I suspected mine had inadvertently been swapped around. One evening around 6pm my wife answered the phone and called me over to say it was TVR on the phone to chat to me about radiators and expansion tanks! How's that for service. Same happened when I started planning the brakes on the Griff, I wrote to the factory and soon Neill got me on the phone to offer his help.

Love this

And I can't see Neill Anderson spending all that time developing better brakes for the last run of Griffiths and Chimaeras if he didn't think it improved the cars, TVR may have had the AP calipers on the shelf from the new T cars but to develop a five stud conversion and have special wheels cast or the Griffith & Chimaera takes some investment.

Development is all about moving things on to deliver improvements, Neill Anderson knew this as it was his job after all, if we all just sat about saying what we have is fine we'd still be living in caves.

I love my Brembo brake upgrade, it made a huge improvement to my car, fine is fine but better is better..... and better brakes are a big improvement on these cars

For the record the wheels on the Griffith I saw recently had five stud versions of these wheels fitted to the never to surface Speed Six Griifith.



They looked exactly like the above but had five studs not the four we see here on the aborted Speed Six Griifith.

[citizen smith]

If only I could get a pair of 16" Estorils for my car, then the Brake upgrade would be a great improvement.

[Hedgehopper]

ChimpOnGas said:

No, just fit the 300mm disc version and they go under the 15" front wheels no problem at all.

Dave, would you explain this in more detail. What is the 300mm disc version and what does it comprise of? I thought that the biggest disc that would fit a 15" wheel was 283mm and even that was marginal.

[900T-R]

ChimpOnGas said:

Love this

And I can't see Neill Anderson spending all that time developing better brakes for the last run of Griffiths and Chimaeras if he didn't think it improved the cars, TVR may have had the AP calipers on the shelf from the new T cars but to develop a five stud conversion and have special wheels cast or the Griffith & Chimaera takes some investment.

They didn't. The thing was they were sitting on a boatload of 16-inch Spider wheels as 95 percent of Tuscan and Tamora customers went for the 18-inch option (fools, even Peter Wheeler commented that they set up a car as welle as they could, then punters would pay them good money to ruin it) and decided to machine a load of hubs for the 5-bolt PCD so they could throw them on the Griff and Chim using the std T-car brakes as a factory upgrade. PH reported on it back in 2001 or 2002 and the price for the whole kit including tyres was an unrepeatable £1,400 which made it a bit of a no-brainer.

[ray von]

900T-R said:

ChimpOnGas said:

Love this

And I can't see Neill Anderson spending all that time developing better brakes for the last run of Griffiths and Chimaeras if he didn't think it improved the cars, TVR may have had the AP calipers on the shelf from the new T cars but to develop a five stud conversion and have special wheels cast or the Griffith & Chimaera takes some investment.

They didn't. The thing was they were sitting on a boatload of 16-inch Spider wheels as 95 percent of Tuscan and Tamora customers went for the 18-inch option (fools, even Peter Wheeler commented that they set up a car as welle as they could, then punters would pay them good money to ruin it) and decided to machine a load of hubs for the 5-bolt PCD so they could throw them on the Griff and Chim using the std T-car brakes as a factory upgrade. PH reported on it back in 2001 or 2002 and the price for the whole kit including tyres was an unrepeatable £1,400 which made it a bit of a no-brainer.

What Eric said. Anyone who thinks TVR would have 'special wheels cast' for run out cars has had too much sun/rain

[phillpot]

RichB said:

It was good times. My first TVR was an S3c and I wrote to them (this was before email was popular) asking about the correct positions for the pressurised cap and non-pressurised cap on the swirl tank and expansion tank. I suspected mine had inadvertently been swapped around.

And which way round should they be?

[RichB]

phillpot said:

RichB said:

It was good times. My first TVR was an S3c and I wrote to them (this was before email was popular) asking about the correct positions for the pressurised cap and non-pressurised cap on the swirl tank and expansion tank. I suspected mine had inadvertently been swapped around.

And which way round should they be?

Oh crikey, it was 25 yrs ago! I think it was non-sprung cap on the swirl tank and pressurised cap on the expansion tank which seems counter intuitive.