[67 LeMans 326]

Well, after owning a 68 Firebird for the past 10 years and then having it wrecked this past Dec. 12 by an illegal alien, ooops, I mean undocumented visitor. I parted the car out and have now purchased my first "A" body, a 67 LeMans w/54k orig miles. I must say moving into a larger Pontiac was the best thing I could have done, as I am 6'-2" and go 280lbs. With all of this being said, the first thing I noticed with the LeMans was just how scary drum brakes can be on a larger car. I had them on the Bird, but had completely rebuilt them years ago and they worked very well.

Anyway, I am currently losing my vision and only have a short time left before I will loose my license. So, I am trying to get the car safe as can be, knowing my wife will eventually be driving the car to car shows etc. that we will attend. With this in mind the first thing I had to do was address the horrendous braking issues with the LeMans. Opposed to rebuild the original drum brakes I opted for a complete 4-wheel power disc brake system offered by CPP (Classic Performance Parts Inc. from CA).

I found their system on Ebay and was really shocked to see it listed with a $775 starting price. I placed a bid and to my surprize I won the 4-wheel disc system at the $775 price plus $75 shipping. Well, after about 15 days, they finally shipped the parts. I was a bit ticked about the two week delay (this was AFTER I paid via PayPal). However, all the parts arrived and then I had a delay before we could start the install.

Then, last Monday we started the install and things went fairly well as we had a few other projects come along on another car that we were trying to get ready for a car show. After removing the entire old braking system we began to install the new system. Right off the batt we found that all of the ball joints were the original along with the springs, shocks etc. So we detoured and rebuilt the entire front end.

The biggest concern I had was whether or not their disc brake system would fit my non original (repop) Pontiac Rally I rims which I had just installed a brand new set of Diamondback red line tires so there was no turning back and switching to 15"s. Once we got the spindles installed with the new springs we were able to mount the calipers and test the 14" Rally I's and YES, they fit. I will say though, they BARELY clear!

Well, now it was on to the rears. Much like the front we soon discovered that the rearend had all of it's original bearings and off we went to get all new bearings. Having to pull the axles we certainly could not put them back in without replacing all the bearings, so this set us back yet again.

Once we had the old bearings cut off the axles and the new bearings pressed on, we continued on with the install. By now we were 4 days into the project and finally able to test fit the rear wheels to ensure that they too would clear the new disc brakes. Well, sure enough, as close as the fronts were, the backs we even closer yet and required grinding a c-hair off the caliper brackets. This was no problem as the brackets had more than enough meat on them and actually could have been made with the same radious as the caliper and all would have been fine.

Now, one word of advise (which is why I am posting this info in the event anyone is considering a 4-wheel disc conv.) would be to purchase a complete pre-bent brake line kit that goes with the exact system you are installing. All of the existing brake lines did in fact have to be cut back, re-bent, new ends etc. So we opted to buy the correct size tubing and bend all of our own new lines. Again, had I known, I would have purchased the entire pre-bent line kit directly from CPP and this would have saved us a TON of time.

As for the completeness of the "kit", there were a few issues. First, they do include 10 new lug studs for your axles as the new rotors are thicker than the old drums. The problem was, they sent be 9 correct studs and one that was WAY TOO BIG. Now I realize, this was a simple mistake on someone's part, but nonetheless it is aggravating to have to wait for another or to go and have to try and find one to buy etc.

In addition to the lug stud mix up I did run into another issue with the E-brake cables (the ones that were already on the car). The issue is this, the inside part of the cable that has the keeper end on it, is long enough to reach the new E-brake lever on the new calipers, however, the outer part of the cable is too short and does not reach the part of the bracket that would hold the outter sheild of the cable. I called CPP's tech support and was told that I needed E-brake extenders which they are in fact shipping to me free of charge. However, I now have to wait for them along with the other lug stud.

I am now at the point of the install where everything is mounted, all new lines run and everything is connected and the entire system has been bled out about a million times. The front brakes are working perfectly however, the rears are barely moving. I called their tech support and was told that because the E-brakes are not hooked up that the rears will not close enough to stop the rotor. Personally, I think this is total BS as the caliper does not care if the E-brake cable is attached or not.

After spending two hours on CPP's web site in the trouble shooting section I stumbled on to a PDF file under "misc" section and what I found is a page that tells you that their distribution blocks are capable of either disc/disc or disc/drum applications, however, if you are using this on a disc/disc system, you have to "remove a rubber piston from the isolation valve for 4-wheel disc brakes". The car is over my friend's house on his lift so I have not been able to check and see if this rubber piston is in fact inside the dist. block or not. This will be the first thing I will try tomorrow morning and I am hoping this will solve the problem. If it does, than the fact that this company a) did not have ANYTHING in their instructions about this and b) their tech support knows nothing about this rubber piston situation and c) they could easily put a simple sticker on the side of the distribution block/valve.

I'll follow this thread until the end and will post more pics as well. So far, the product seems decent and the fit is good. The packing error, shipping delay, lack of E-brake extenders and the "tech support" all could use some improvement. Tech support pretty much gives you the hurry up and get off the phone scenario ie: as soon as I mentioned that I did not have the E-brake cable connected, the guy immediately tells me, "this is definately your problem" before I even finished telling him my problem. Oh well, hopefully the E-brake extenders will arrive tomorrow and we get this project completed and we can move on to installing my brand new 400 and a 4-speed conversion!