Lightening the "Front" drums on a lathe?
 

With all the discussion about "sprung" and "unsprung" weight reduction I started looking into finding a lighter drum. Well, for my 71 Ventura there aren't many choices unless you go disc.

Here's the "Idea": Can I chuck the factory front brake drums in a lathe and remove all the cooling fins? I have some extemely heavy front drums because of the really tall and thick fins. Any comments good or bad?

I have the 9" rearend which I believe has light weight drums available. JD

why wouldnt you want to go with discs? you can get a very nice piece from aerospace to switch to discs and you will loose a couple pounds

Interesting idea. But I think I'd be a little concerned with the drum warping/distorting without the fins.

Jim

I'd have to agree with 66 here, those fins are not just for cooling, I think they also function as stiffening ribs too, just go on racing junk or e-bay to find a used set of aerospace or wilwood front disc brake kit, they have them on there all the time and you don't want to fool with the front like that because of the heat generated and the fact that 70% of your stopping power comes from the front of your vehicle! And where did you find lightweight drums for the rear of a 9in ford, I was looking before I purchased the entire aerospace kit for my car(front kit, rear kit, master, and all braided lines) and had no luck?:(

you could cut it to its max recomended usable inside diameter and remove every other fin, i think they are ballanced?

Another good point! They are balanced, but cutting/resurfacing the drums to the max could cause the wheel cylinder to push out to it's limits and Bye Bye brake fluid! God forbid if he has one of those single resovior master cylinders!!!!:eek::eek::eek:

Thanks All!

1. I think I found aluminum brake frums for the 9" ford from the street rod croud. It's been a while I'd have to look into again.

2. Thanks for the "Balance" issue this was not originally considered.

3. The strength issue and heat build up are good goo.

My car has a dual resevoir master cylinder w/manual brakes factory.

Budget or the lack there of is why I don't run out and buy a disc/brake setup. I was looking at low cost or free ways to increase performance. Thanks for the feedback, keep em coming! JD

Aren't disc brakes heavier than drums???

Are they the 9 1/2 x 2 1/2 drums? My 65 LeMans had non-finned rotors on the front and are way lighter than the finned ones, had the non-finned on the rear too! Those drums to me seem to be way lighter than a heavy duty style "race" rotor but most guys prefer the stopping power of a disc brake car although I personally never had a problem stopping with an all drum brake car as I leave my car in gear and let off the gas at the end of the track which takes off most of the speed and lightly tap the brakes But I guess if you have an engine failure or something your going to need the best brakes possible... Thanks D. Miles

yeah, but im pretty sure when you do the aerospace kit, you actually lose weight cause prettuy much the whole kit is made of aluminum

The Aerospace Comp kit for the front is worth the money. I did it on my 73 Bird. Worked great and did cut some weight.

I also put the Aerospace kit on the rears. It probably braked better, but I saw no performance gain. I should have just left the aluminum drums on and put the 5 bills somewhere else.

65-66 GTO's were available with optional ALUM FINNED front drums. My 66 came with a set. They are considerably lighter than finned steel drums, which I also have & lighter than factory disk brake systems.
Buick also had finned alum front drums in 9.5" diam. I have a set of these also; the fins are different & the drums are a couple of pounds lighter than the GTO drums. I am not sure what years/models Buick used these drums on, but I was told that are usually cheaper than the GTO drums, so maybe they were used on more models & not so rare.

The caliper, center hub, caliper bracket is aluminum. The rotors are thinner then a OE design and the pads are smaller, but you add a little weight back with the 1/2" studs. It depends on the car but you can lose up to 50lbs over drums, with a little time setting up the clearances you can set them up to have less drag as well.

On a Ventura an aerospace kit places the caliper to the front while the wilwood places the caliper in the "conventional" rear location. Wilwood calipers are prone to wheel clearance problems. Strange makes a good brake as well.

You come across the kits used from time to time on Racing Junk, I found mine here.

For what they cost new, you could come close to the same weight savings with a set of M/T front runners and wheels.

DANGER, Will Robinson!!!

We have been involved with one lawsuit against Aerospace Brakes. The "pins" used to hold the pads in are really hardened bolts. Bad. A soft pin is used in the Toyota system they're patterned after. In this case, the bolt broke, right at the beginning of the threads, spitting the pad out of the caliper. The result was a wrecked race car, and Aerospace paid for it. A "soft" pin would have bent, but the pad would have stayed in place. Their "disclaimer" didn't include engineering ignorance... Typical of a college boy with no "practical application" experience, he assumed (we KNOW what happens when you "assume") a "hard" bolt would be better than the soft pin Toyota used. The judge agreed with the plaintiff and Aerospace paid.

Engineers, don't get riled here. The BEST engineers I've ever worked with were line techs before they got their degrees. The second best were guys (or gals) that were fresh out of school but had enough sense to listen to the techs while learning what it was they were supposed to "engineer". And the "bad" ones are the ones that get a degree and believe that's the end, and they know it ALL. Smart people know a good education is the BASIS on which to START learning to be an expert in a given field.

Jim

My friend has a 64 Cutlass and its front drums are not even finned I know there lighter than the later finned ones and there the same size.