Hydro Boost and Wilwood Calipers

[Cole]

I heard that it isn't recommended to run Hydro Boost brakes with the Dynalite Wilwood calipers. Does anyone know if this is true or if its ok to run. Thinking about putting Hydroboost on the buggy so that its easier for Lori to drive. She has a really hard time with the brakes and they pretty much suck since I switched to Wilwood Calipers.

 

[Elliott]

I don't know about the hydro boost setup, but a lot of street rods use they're calipers with power brake setups.Wouldnt that be the same?

 

[civicmindedex79]

Yea I dont know bout buggies but got a friend that just finished up a hot rod that has a full wilwood setup and it is hydro.

 

[wannabe]

why not just call wildwood?

 

[KyTrash]

Hydro makes more pressure.

 

[Cole]

why not just call wildwood?

Wilwood isn't that easy to get in touch with, but I am going to try this week. I figured someone on here may know or have tried so thats why I asked.

 

[Elliott]

Hydro may make more pressure, but I had an old dually that leaked out some power steering fluid going down the road while I was pulling my 20 ft gooseneck loaded, a person stopped in front of me and when I went to slow down didn't have a stitch of brakes. I would never put hydro boost on anything because of that.It prob works fine on a Buggie but it gave me a bad taste about it.And cole wonder why it changed your brake pedal so much, just not moving enough fluid?

 

[fl-krawler]

Are you running 4 or 6 piston calipers? The 4 piston ones have a huge problem with caliper flex, and it only gets worst with the more pressure you add to the system. On my last buggy I had a vacuum boost brake setup and my brakes were horrible with the wilwood calipers. Wilwood told me to not exceed 1000psi on the brakes as that was all they were designed to handle. There is a pretty good thread on pirate about the wilwood/spidertrax/tubeworks brake setup and switching to hydroboost and off the shelf oem brake parts. They aren't as bling or light, but work better.

 

[Blase]

No clue. Just to clarify your brakes got worse after you put the willwood calipers on? Everything else stayed the same?

 

[Cole]

No clue. Just to clarify your brakes got worse after you put the willwood calipers on? Everything else stayed the same?

Yeah way worse. They have never been good but now they are pretty much no existent.

 

[TBItoy]

what pedal and master cylinders are you running?

 

[onetoncrawler]

My brakes worked great with the will wood calipers and all - what kind of brake line are you running? What size MC?

 

[Cole]

I had 2 brake pedals one for the front and one for the rear and both had 1" MCs, when I put all the new stuff on it wouldn't hold the buggy. I had a buddy take one of the pedals out and now all I have is a 1" MC running all 4 brakes. It will stop the buggy but you have to push the pedal all the way to the floor. My goal is to make it easy for Lori. I know a few people who have hydroboost and I really like it because it stops just like my truck.

 

[Bones]

Do you have the room for hydroboost? It's a space hog!

 

[Cole]

Do you have the room for hydroboost? It's a space hog!

Woodlee has a kit that is very small, looked at this weekend on BJs new buggy and believe it will fit on mine.

 

[braggf150]

rkey running hydro with wiwood calipers i think he pretty much loves it

 

[patooyee]

Are you running 4 or 6 piston calipers? The 4 piston ones have a huge problem with caliper flex, and it only gets worst with the more pressure you add to the system. On my last buggy I had a vacuum boost brake setup and my brakes were horrible with the wilwood calipers. Wilwood told me to not exceed 1000psi on the brakes as that was all they were designed to handle. There is a pretty good thread on pirate about the wilwood/spidertrax/tubeworks brake setup and switching to hydroboost and off the shelf oem brake parts. They aren't as bling or light, but work better.

This is all true.

I have consulted Wilwood about this and they do not recommend it. Their calipers are made for 1000 psi max. Hydroboost will be at least 1500 psi., vacuum boost will be 1000+. Depending on your system, what psi it runs at, etc, possibly way more.

Taking the second MC out didn't help your situation, your fluid displacement was halved by that, probably resulting in more pedal required to accomplish the same amount of braking. If you had enough pedal travel before you took it out, I would try putting another one back in only a smaller dia. MC, maybe 3/4" or so.

Generally speaking, smaller bore = more pedal travel with higher pressure. Bigger bore = less pedal travel with lower pressure. It sounds like your girl doesn't have as much leg strength as you, so basically she's not able to generate as much line pressure. That's why I say smaller bore MC if you have enough pedal travel to accommodate it.

That and / or the calipers could be flexing, which wouldn't surprise me in the least bit. Wilwood calipers were designed to stop light little sprint cars on the street, not heavy 4x4's with 40"+ tires trying to cling to a mountain. Back in the day Dibble had major issues with dual piston Wilwood calipers flexing when he was trying to do wheel brakes on his rockwells. I think he posted a video with the rig just sitting there and you could watch the caliper flex. Here's some others you can find online:

Wilwood Caliper Flex #5 on Vimeo
Wilwood Caliper Flex 2nd Video on Vimeo
Wilwood Caliper Flex #4 on Vimeo

Doesn't sound like whatever vehicle that is is running in the vids. IE, no boost yet. Any boost is just going to make it worse.

 

[Blase]

I agree with Patooyee. ......I think. From what i've read you need two 3/4" master cylinders with 2lbs residual pressure valves for the calipers that you are running. wether you run them on two pedals is up to you.

I know I had 1 7/8 and 1 1" master on 1/2 ton chevy calipers when I first built my buggy and I had a hard time stopping it. after some reading I switched to two 3/4" masters and 2 lbs pressure valves I was MUCH happier!! still not BJ hydro boost good but almost twice as good as they were with less leg effort. I had a little longer stroke on the brake pedal but not too bad.

For the cost of new master cylinders and some residual pressure valves I'd give that a shot before you junk all those new calipers and rotors that you bought!!

If you do decide hydro boost is the way to go can you put a thicker rotor on those new hubs that you bought? And would you need to? I know Bjs set up uses a "thin" rotor but i'm not sure how thick it is.

 

[fl-krawler]

More pedal ratio will also help with making the pedal easier to push. Just out of curiousity, have you run billavista's brake calculator to get an idea of where you are at, and where you would like to be.

Some good reading here
http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/general-4x4-discussion/904647-wilwood-brakes.html

 

[crawlin85cj]

The Wilwood setup in my old Jimmy's car was bad ass for manual brakes. Dynalite calipers, Spidertrax rotors, dual 3/4" MCs and -4 AN lines all the way through.

Both my hydroboost setups are kick ass and each is different from the other. The nice thing about hydroboost is the margin of engineering error it provides. Given a choice I will never run anything but hydroboost. It just flat works and brakes aren't something to gamble on experimenting IMO.