R33 Gts-T Calipers Onto A 240...now Completed

[KatoKid]

So Ive done the obligatory searching and not come up with anything solid here....

Ive got R33 GTS-T calipers, looking for dogbones and which discs to use? Needs to be for a 240 not a 260 because I want the extra offset you get from using the thinner 240 hubs.

Anyone got this set up?

I believe R32 GTR calipers are the same or very similar so anyone using this setup could help.

SW and datsport cant help.

Thanks.

David

Edited August 23, 2015 by KatoKid

[C.A.R.]

I have the Z32 (same as R33 I believe) with early Mustang rotors & machined down (i.e. shorter hat height) 260Z hubs. No caliper dogbone is used.

I haven't compared hat height to an original 240Z setup, but your welcome to borrow them to try them out David...

[Zedman240®]

Speak to Chris Wood. He can do anything!

[KatoKid]

Thanks for the offer Lurch but Z32 must be different.  GTS-T caliper mounts has 100mm centres vs 90mm for the 240 struts....back to square one.

 

Dimitri, thanks for your PM, will look for something more conventional than your set up...for now anyway!

[Zedman240®]

No probz.

The R33 and Z32/R32 calipers are different. From memory, the offset? (distance from mounting tabs to centre of the caliper) is different and the height. The R33 caliper was for a larger disc. Also, mounting was a different distance between mounting "ears". Gerhard (NDSOC member) can do the mods to run the Z32/R32 caliper with the Mustang disc with 260 hubs to run on the front of a 240 or 260Z.

[garvice]

If the others won't do it Scott at maddat will but don't expect it to be quick. He did custom hubs for my brake/strut conversion do i could run my current watanabes. He will probably try and talk you out of the skyline calipers though.

[Matt]

i used the caliper brackets on yahoo auction japan

fits r32 gtst calipers with r33 gtst rotors(bored and redrilled) on to 240z hubs

for 260z hubs use honda odyssey rotors(bored, drilled and turned down in size)

 

i also ran the offset rca for rotor clearance to the lca, all from the same seller.

then t3 released them for half the price....

 

honestly wilwoods would of been better for the $ spent.

 

hope thumbnail works...

 

[Scando]

I'm running them with 330mm 2 piece DBA rotors (I think for an STI from memory) on custom hats.  A mate made the hats and dog bones for me which kept the cost of the conversion very reasonable.  Paying full price for the machine work would blow the cost out a bit.

[KatoKid]

Thanks Matt, saw your thread and was going to ask you. R32 GTS-T had 2 different sizes depending on early or late? Have you got a link to yahoo auction? Offset RCA is going to push the wheel out so will try and stay away from that!

 

Thanks Shane, think Im going to do it myself from scratch. Know someone who should be able to machine for reasonable money.

 

Cheers

[lampy]

I have seen a few people machine a slug of alloy and interference fit it in the holes in the caliper.

The face's are machined flat and the correct position holes are then drilled.

These have been on all out race cars and have had no issues

 

Be aware r33 calipers have the thread in a pressed in steel insert in the caliper whereas 240z have the thread in the strut ears

[KatoKid]

Yep, thanks lampy

[44014]

I had 33 calipers fitted to one of my projects that never got on the road.

It was just a piece of 1/2 thick steel bolted to he original 240z ears and then a thread tapped into the steel for the 33 calipers.

Just a plain flat piece of steel.

[Matt]

ill take any excuse to browse yahoo.jp

 

http://page5.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/e153024791

 

so thats for r32 4pot(280rotor) to r33 297 rotor, which will use 240z hubs.

 

if my memorys right caliper sizing are;

this r32 caliper is the same as r33 non-turbo,

r32 gtr is same as r33 gtst,

and then there is the brembo R package which are all the same

castings are all different tho

[KatoKid]

Thanks Matt and others.

 

Ive looked through the DBA catalogue and there are a few discs that I could use but I think I'm going to stick with the original R33 GTS-T disc which is 296x30mm with a height of 53.75mm. Ive mocked up the front end as I wanted to be able to check for lower control arm clearance which I wouldn't have even thought of without Matt's post.

 

The standard Z disc has a height of 51mm so I put a 3mm spacer between the disc and hub to replicate the height of the R33 GTS-T disc, doing this also bought the disc inboard 3mm to give me more clearance between the caliper and the wheel spokes on the outside but also didn't bring it in far enough to interfere with the LCA. Ive still got about 7-8mm clearance from the LCA.

 

I used a block of wood and some shims to roughly position the caliper where it needs to sit using the standard Z disc and it all looks good, dogbone should be pretty straight forward and Ive got 7-8mm clearance between the outside of the caliper and the wheel spokes so all round a good compromise for positioning......but I really need to confirm with a proper R33 GTS-T disc. Will place an add in wanted for a crappy second hand disc here and on SAU......don't want to buy the real deal until I'm 100% sure they will do the job!

 

[KatoKid]

Been a while but I've finished this........haven't driven it obviously but happy with the way it came out and expect it to work well with R33 booster and master cylinder that I'm using.

 

Found some second hand R33 discs for $60.00, they were in good nick and may use them yet but may also buy the you bewdy DBA ones. Like most brake conversions I had to have a shop bore the center of the disc and also re-drill for 4 holes to mount to the 240 hub.....two weeks waiting for that. Note: when you re-drill 4 holes over a 5 hole pattern you will always end up with one of the 4 pattern holes overlapping a 5th  hole but they are not the same PCD so you can either elongate the overlapped hole or machine a bigger hole and press in a plug and re-drill, which is what the shop recommended.

 

Got the disc mounted up to the hub and on the spindle and then slid the caliper over the disc and tried to position it where it needs to go......uh oh.....problem. The upper ear of the caliper mount cast into the Z spindle was interfering with the caliper.........I was determined to make this conversion work so the only alternative was to drill and tap a new upper caliper  mounting hole and cut off the interfering SOB bit......but (its never easy) the casting just inboard of the original caliper mounting pad is ever so slightly lower than the original mounting pad so I had no choice but to have the shop mill about 0.7mm off the original upper mounting pad and mill further inboard to create a new mounting pad....which meant the lower mounting pad also need to have the same 0.7mm taken off it to keep the caliper aligned parallel with the disc....phew!

 

Once the milling was done I drilled and tapped new holes 20 mm inboard and then cut off the old ears. Fitted the caliper up and all good....just need to make dog bones now! 

Edited August 23, 2015 by KatoKid

[KatoKid]

Dog bones were pretty straight forward.

 

12mm x 65mm flat bar and they had to be spaced 7mm out to center the caliper on the disc. Obvious care had to be taken with patterns and being sure that holes were drilled exactly spot on but other than taking time it was pretty easy.

 

The top caliper bolt is very close the strut tube (50mm 240 strut) and definitely wont clear the MCA struts that Im intending to use as they are 59mm diameter but  a slightly countersunk allenhead bolt will do the job.

 

Pretty happy with the outcome, just hope the engineer feels the same!

Edited August 23, 2015 by KatoKid

[CBR Jeff]

Now that looks serious.

[KatoKid]

I'm intentionally not going to include this in my build thread as I may end up referring my engineer to the build thread and I may or may not present the car for engineering with these brakes as it will depend on whether 15 x 7 wheels will fit over these brakes as the engineer will not like the 16 x 8 option I'm intending to run

 

I bought my new wheels bearings today ($95.00 for front and rear including seals from Bearing Wholesalers in Bayswater) meaning I could put the hubs and brakes on the MCA struts finally.

 

I had to convert the R33 discs which are 5 stud (they slip over the front of the hub and held on by the wheels) to bolt to the 4 bolt holes on the rear of the 240 hub. The problem is that however you try to align the holes there is always one hole that overlies an existing hole so one of these holes had to be plugged. The engineering shop I used was very good and they pressed in a tapered plug and drilled for the new 4 hole pattern. They also had to bore out the center of the disc to fit the 240 hub.

 

Front side of disc:

Back side of disc:

 

The dogbones worked out really well and fitted up with the gold zinc plated bolts.

  

 

I had to slightly grind the top caliper bolt head and discard the spring washer so it didn't hit the strut tube .

 

 

Just need to sort brake lines once the struts are in the car.

Edited January 11, 2017 by KatoKid

[KatoKid]

Now that my car is fully engineered, registered and legal thought I would update this thread.

 

So do the brakes work....yup. How well....very bloody well!

 

The engineer had no issues withe the mods or fabrication. The braking test required for VASS engineering certification is the same test as the ADR requirement which is 12 x consecutive max stops from 60 kmh followed immediately by 2 x max stops from 100 kmh  with the requirement for no sign of fade and consistent stopping. The engineer was very happy with the performance of these brakes when combined with the matching R33 GTS-T master/booster and R31 rears. 

 

This is not a bolt on conversion but if you have a competent and reasonably priced machinest this is an excellent and affordable choice. I really wanted the Nissan branded calipers and on the road the feel and power is awesome. I suspect that they will be more than adequate for  any track day shenanigans! 

[GregTas]

That's pleasing to hear. Did you have to get some custom flexible lines made up or was there something you were able to buy off the shelf?

 

For my brakes same setup, but no booster. I think I would have rathered a booster, but the car already had a twin master cylinder pedal box fitted and so I'd thought I'd try it out. Not sure how it'll go. I have my doubts.

[KatoKid]

Hi Greg.

 

Front flexible lines were braided steel but same as factory otherwise. Check my build thread for more details where I had to swap calipers from side to side.

 

I've not had experience with proper bias adjustable twin master cylinder pedal box  setups but everything I read says they are excellent for modulation but do require a lot more pedal pressure....which you get used to. Mine has a lot of power and is typical of what you would expect in a modern car where little old ladies need to be able to panic stop as well as anyone else and this is not always desirable in a high performance car.

[GregTas]

Thanks. Saves getting some made up.

[PET240]

What rear brakes are you running please?

Remember R31 I think from your build thread but this puts all the brakes in one place for reference!

 

Many Thanks!

 

Drew

 

[Agno]

On 12/10/2017 at 8:18 PM, KatoKid said:

Now that my car is fully engineered, registered and legal thought I would update this thread.

 

So do the brakes work....yup. How well....very bloody well!

 

The engineer had no issues withe the mods or fabrication. The braking test required for VASS engineering certification is the same test as the ADR requirement which is 12 x consecutive max stops from 60 kmh followed immediately by 2 x max stops from 100 kmh  with the requirement for no sign of fade and consistent stopping. The engineer was very happy with the performance of these brakes when combined with the matching R33 GTS-T master/booster and R31 rears. 

 

This is not a bolt on conversion but if you have a competent and reasonably priced machinest this is an excellent and affordable choice. I really wanted the Nissan branded calipers and on the road the feel and power is awesome. I suspect that they will be more than adequate for  any track day shenanigans! 

In future read the thread a bit more thoroughly...