Rear Disk Brakes...Is there really a need? Talk it over.

Troy, I accepted the conventional wisdom and advice from Carey and did not originally build Natalie with rear disc brakes.  I locked them up a lot.   Then, I had the opportunity to drive Jack's car in Arkansas in the mountains.  What a difference.

The summer of 2012 I had a couple of near misses.  My car accelerates faster than people are expecting and is closer than it appears due to the size....and my driving style has created a few situations.

Last winter, Carey installed rear disc brakes and a bigger master cylinder on Natalie.  She stops quicker, straighter, with far less locking up.

It's one of the things I scrimped on in the beginning, but seat time changed my mind.

When the beetle platform was first put together, highway speeds were lower and no one envisioned what we'd be doing with them now. A drum brake beetle will lose it's brakes at somewhere between 30-40 mph when panic stopped from 75mph, and it's a very scary experience. VW recognized the need for better brakes as speeds got higher and put front discs on the Ghia, 411/412 and the later model buses. I have found that unless you're pushing the car really hard, a front disc upgrade is more than adequate. Type 3 rear drums are a fantastic upgrade to these cars and with I don't think you could ever tax rear discs beyond their capabilities (on the street). It's their ability to shed heat way beyond what a drum is capable of.  

Typically, it's a bit tougher to "lock up" disk Brakes, but that, alone, isn't enough reason to go that route.

You always hear the argument that 80% of your braking power is in the front wheels, and that is very true.  In all the years I drove beetle sedans I changed front shoes every other year or so and never changed rear shoes even once.  Same thing on all of my cars - almost never touched the rears.

That said, the only advantage I can think of for rear disks on speedsters is what Jack Crosby keeps telling us - the car will stop in a straight line with no pulling to one side or the other if you have disks all around.  Very true.  

Ford must be convinced of greater stopping power with rear disks, because my last pickup (F150) went from rear drums to rear disks when you ordered the "trailering package", so those crafty designers had to know something I don't.

One thing I found that increased drum stopping power is an 11 pound residual valve between the master cylinder and the rear brakes.  It holds the shoes a bit closer to the drum when off-pedal and gets the shoes to engage sooner with a bit more pedal-power (it seems to me, anyway).  A residual valve is not needed on rear disks.

This help?  Gn

Here's the thing- a replica speedster is very light in the front. Everybody agrees that front discs are "de rigueur", because front brakes generally provide the bulk of stopping power on a car. However, because of the significant rear bias in most of our cars (SAS and spyders excepted), the rear brakes actually do quite a bit more of the work than we're used to.

Properly adjusted drum-brakes probably work adequately. However, they require more care and feeding than disc-brakes (which are self-adjusting). When running 4 wheel discs, a different (bigger bore) master cylinder is something that is really needed-- just putting a brake kit on, without changing the master cylinder is a recipe for middling brake performance. Some guys a lot smarter than me have figured out that the rear cylinders on most readily available brake kits are actually smaller than ideal. A biasing valve installed on the front circuit (rather than the rear) might be needed.

The take-away is that more (not less) braking power ought to be applied to the rear as our cars have a significant rear weight bias.

A good test is to lock up the brakes on a dry surface. Ideally, all 4 wheels lock up at pretty much the same time (with a slight bias to the front brakes). If you can do that with drums, then by all means-- rock on. I like discs for the ease of set-up, better "feel", and ultimately for potentially better braking performance.

Brakes are really, really cheap in the big scheme of things, especially in comparison to a stay in the ICU. A guy can do as he pleases, but I'd economize elsewhere.

I'm not a mechanic, brake expert, etc.

That being said, for the slightly additional extra cost, I'd feel better about having disc brakes on all 4 for any car (356 rep or other) that I'd buy. In fact, if it didn't add too much cost, I'd even consider upgrading to ABS if it were ever an option.

How's that current widebody project coming along Troy, lol?

i HAD TWO SPEEDSTERS AT THE SAME TIME, ONE WITH FRONT DISC ONE WITH FOUR DISK. i NOTICED A BIG DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE TWO. Oops cap lock.

Very few of us will ever be close to flipping one of our replcas.  However, almost all of us will have the occassional panic stop.  Many times we unintentionally cause them just be being where we are in our cars.  Remember that time when that other driver's jaw dropped as he looked at your car, and he completely forgot that he was driving through an intersection with other traffic around?

Your circumstances will vary, but our cars do have the ability to render other drivers dumb, both literally and figuratively.  In those cases, I want the best brakes I can get.  For my $$, that's 4 x discs. 

2 speedster...2 set ups.m one with disc on all 4 and one with just the fronts.  I did notice a difference in having all 4...better stopping power all around.  Just make sure you put on the bigger master cylinder.  When I built my 2nd vintage I had them do all 4 but they put the master cylinder for 2 and the brakes were not right until we switched out to bigger master cylinder.

Troy:

Disc brakes up front with rear drums in the rear are adequate for the reason you mentioned, locked up brakes are locked up brakes, and I've locked up on at least one emergency braking situation (VW disc brakes front and 315-type rear shoes/drums.

I would qualify that rear drums are adequate if: (1) you have the wider 315-type 40mm shoes (rather than the earlier 270-type 30mm wide shoes); (2) the rear shoes properly adjusted (probably one reason for advocating disc brakes at the rear would be eliminating this aspect and eliminating a maintenance issue); and (3) you have braided SS steel brake lines (or great like-new condition rubber lines).  If you have old rubber lines you'll be amazed at how replacing with a set of braided SS lines will stiffen up an otherwise soft pedal feel.

But for the low cost of adding rear discs, and if you are looking for a project that will reduce at least the need to adjust rear shoes, then why not.  Just not a great performance gain. 

Grant

It would be an excellent thing to see some 60-0 stopping distance figures on these cars, differently configured. 

It's not about locked up brakes.  It's about maximum performance before they lock up.  It's the difference between a zig-zag panic stop with the possibility of loosing control vs. a straight ahead, controlled stop in minimum distance.

Been there, done that and hated the drum brake emergency stop on I-40 outside of Nashville.

Good enough may be ok for some but not when it costs you your life.

I doubt there would be a difference...but I don't know...I think I have made one panic stop in nearly a million miles of driving...to miss a deer..

My cars all have disc brakes including my yet to arrive JPS...but if they didn't I wouldn't worry about it. 

If you drive with adequate sight and stopping distance drum brakes should be fine.  

I am no expert but I am a old motorcycle rider and know the necessity of driving defensively and keeping your vehicle in tip top shape.   

I upgraded to rear discs 2 seasons ago and immediately noticed the improvement.

I find it difficult to understand that others won't admit to the enhanced stopping power.

I can only speak for myself...I don't think it is a refusal to admit to it... If I saw some empirical data that proved that rear disc provided a shorter straighter stopping distance I would be the first to admit to the fact.. till I do, I am simply skeptical.   

I'm not advocating for one way or the other, but how can you argue with a locked up wheel scenario?  These cars don't have ABS and in a panic stop you are going to lock up all 4 wheels and once they are locked up it couldn't matter less if there is a drum or a disk behind that wheel.

Most of the comments seem to be about what makes us "feel" safer, but are we really?

Like Bart said, I'd like to see some real data.  I'm sure that disks aren't going to be worse than drums, so until the data comes along, I guess there is no harm in erroring on the safe side and putting disks on the rear.

Sounds like a job for Myth Busters.

As I understand it disks provide much better fade resistance, but I have never heard that a disk is notable better at stopping the first time.  That said, I do like the idea of a much straighter stop due to the lack of needing periodic manual adjustment.

Great topic Troy.  A lot of good input from fellow members.   Here's my $0.02:

First of all, we can all agree that front discs are far superior to front drums, that's a given.

Braking tranfers weight to the front tires, the harder you stop, the greater the weight transfer.  Rear engine cars have an inherent braking advantage since the heavy lump of metal is not already loading the front end, but make no mistake, significant weight is transfering forward even with a rear engine.  The rear brakes have an interesting job.  At slight braking 60%+ of the weight of the car is on the rear axle.  In a hard emergency stop, weight transfer may only leave 30% of the weight of the car on the rear axle.  The worst case is having the rear brakes lock up prematurely in an emergency stop due to lighter loading causing a potentially disastrous spin. (Ever been on ice and have the back of the car suddenly pass the front of the car, giving you a great view of the road behind you through the windshield?  Congratulations if you survived that experience).  To prevent his scenario, engineers use smaller less powerful brakes on the rear axle, smaller diameter rotors, or drums, proportioning valves, anti-lock, etc..  Look at a modern car, you may have 13" rotors in front with 4 piston calipers, and 11" rotors in back with single piston calipers.

A locked wheel, whether with or discs, has the same stopping power.  The difference is the additional sensitivity and consistency of a disc brake vs. a drum brake that may be more prone to premature lock.  My experience has shown me that at the limit, I can better trust discs, where drums have often surprised me, when driving at 10/10ths.  We all know that maximum braking happens just on the verge of lock up, skidding to a stop greatly increases braking distance, not to mention the risk of loss of control if rear brakes lock up before the fronts.

So if you slam on the brakes and slide to a longish stop, it does not matter if you have rear drums or discs, at that point you are just along for the ride.  If your rear drums are adjusted perfectly to lock up a millisecond after the front discs and you can consistently apply the perfect brake pressure to stay right the the edge of lock up until the cars stops, then again no difference, stopping distance will be determined by the available traction between the tires and the road surface.

But in reality, no one can consistently and continually adjust rear drums so finely, and unless one of us in currently a factory formula 1 driver, our braking foot is also not so finely calibrated and skilled.  Without modern electronic wizardry, rear discs offer much greater sensitivity and consistency when driving at the limit.  Now for street use, if anyone is driving that hard on public roads, I pray you are not anywhere near my family risking the lives of my loved ones.  I don't drive hard enough on the street to notice a difference, I save that for the track.

stop shouting 

And the normally shouting pot calls the shouting kettle, black........sigh...

Anyway, if I had the choice of 4-wheel disks OR front disks and rear drums BUT with vacuum assist on all four, I would do the vacuum booster in a heartbeat.  Even with having to periodically balance the rear drums manually, that brake booster would be SO nice, but the only guy (other than all of the SAS cars, plus, the SAS cars have ABS, too)  that has one is Simon Hambly over in the UK.

This isn't necessarily true, Troy, and gets to the meat of the argument.

In the real world (where guys struggle to find a plugged idle jet and clean it), drum brakes are almost never adjusted correctly. Improperly adjusted drum brakes mean all 4 wheels are not going to lock up at the same time. More likely, in a panic-stop, one will lock up, and one will not. I've driven some cars that were pretty bad.

Even if the fade-resistance and "feel" were the same (they are not), disc brakes are a better solution because they don't require adjustment. As I said, a guy can do what he likes, but I'll bet there's not one guy in 100 on this site who regularly checks their drum brake adjustment.

There's an important aside that I hit on in my post above, and I feel needs to be gone over again: the imperfect design of some VW disc brake packages. The standard aftermarket 2 circuit master cylinder works pretty well with front discs and rear drums, and not very well at all with 4-wheel discs. When you add the rear discs, YOU REALLY NEED TO CHANGE THE MASTER CYLINDER to a big-bore model. After you get it all together, you really need to try your brakes on a wet surface to ensure that the fronts lock just before the backs (but that the backs do indeed lock). There are a lot of different brake kits, with parts mixed and matched as needed. It's up to you to make sure they are playing well together.

"Stop" is never as sexy as "go", but it's many, many times more important.

Ever stop to wonder why all modern cars don't have drum brakes on the rear of they are "ok"? 

Because I have drum brakes on the rear I cannot stop to wonder... it's dangerous man.

Great point Jack!

Do rear discs move the wheels out.

If so, I can stop considering them.

I love mine! I just couldn't get the drums adjusted evenly. I did the fronts first and loved them so much I did the rears. Set 'em and forget 'em! Blackie stops damn good too!

~WB

Jack.

"Modern cars" have ABS and I'm pretty sure there are still some "modern cars" that come with disc brakes so I'm not sure it's a valid point.

Again, I'm not arguing one way or the other, I'm just trying to understand why discs would be better, if they really are better.

The anecdotal information in most of these posts is interesting, but not really scientific.  On the other hand, there have been some very good points made by Pdrvr and Stan.

Troy--I believe that all modern cars come with disc brakes--not just "some"..  I'm not aware of any still using drums but maybe you know different.  Any car makers still using drums come to mind?

Jack-

There are some inexpensive cars (some Kias, et al) that can still be had with rear drums. All new cars have front discs and ABS.

I think the Ford Focus has rear drums.  They're not cars but I know that Toyota Tacomas have rear drums. 

http://www.tacomaworld.com/for...um-brakes-why-3.html

The first sentence of my last message should have said come with drum brakes, not disc brakes.

I don't think there's really denying the advantages of the superior technology discs afford, but for those who want to improve the performance of their rear drum brakes-  http://www.thesamba.com/vw/cla...detail.php?id=846684 

These semi-metallic shoes still won't equal discs, but are supposed to be a big step in the right direction.

What about discs in back and drums in front?? 

Jim.....   Thats called "A swift kick in the head".....   

I have to weigh in here....

I have CSP solid discs in front and type1 drums in the back. I do have the wider type3 shoes in there, drums were machined to take the shoes. This year I experienced brake fade for the first time.

We were at Cowan's Gap and I hotfooted my way out of there with Mr. Frazer. Before anybody gets their panties wadded up it's a state park and there are no houses or intersections. Plus, I only drove quickly where I could see, using good sightlines. Anyway, it is two miles of curved bliss. Many times I crossed the center line, which is grooved and bumpy as heck, I was driving pretty fast. I would say it was 9/10ths or more. 

My point is I made my brakes fade in TWO MILES. I wonder if they would with four wheel discs and vented in the front? Remember, my Spyder only weighs 1450 pounds. But I definitely think that will be a mod for the future, vented front rotors and solid disks in the back, along with a different MC.

Troy--excuse my post.  I should have known what you meant--my bad.

Danny

I tracked two Miatas (one with V8 power) and spent a fair amount of time trying to improve their braking performance.

The biggest improvement (decrease in brake fade) came from choosing the right pads. Regular, generic pads work great for everyday driving, but for spirited drives or drives on the track performance brake pads are the way to go.

Over the years I've switched to ss brake lines (waste of money), switched to high temperature brake fluid (on the track regular brake fluid can boil after a hard 20 minute session), switched to larger calipers, larger rotors, and performance brake pads.  Performance brake pads gave me the most improvement.

During one track session I heated my V8 Miata's front brakes up so much the heat from the rotors melted the front bearing grease, but the brakes didn't fade.

While driving my 2006 Mini Cooper S (stock brake pads) on the same track my brakes faded at the end of the long straight-a-way and I ended up going off the track. 

Very embarrassing.

Hell, No need for any rear brakes if you have our all new Massive CoolStop 12.5 front disc brake kit.......

Just sayin!!!

Kevin- Will a 15" Fuchs alloy fit around the 12.5" disc and caliper? 11" vented disc and larger (than Ghia or type 3) caliper? Or is the move up to 16" alloys necessary? Al

When Chris and I spot at Daytona for the Rolex, we're directly opposite the "Bus Stop" chicane on the far side of the track.  Even from that distance, you can clearly see the front rotors of most cars get red hot as they approach the chicane.

All of the TRG-prepped Porsches run some sort of ceramic brake pads, along with cross-drilled and vented rotors, just to prevent brake fade in competition.

A few more thoughts worth maybe a penny or two, or maybe less:

Ultimately, braking power is dependant on traction available between the tire/pavement interface.  The more traction available, the faster the car stops.  You can have brakes from a formula one car on a speedster (now that would be an interesting and mindblowingly expensive fabrication!), but with narrow 165 tires the majority of that braking potential would a waste.  Think of braking on an icy road, you have to very delicately apply brakes due to a lack of traction.

As an illustration, My go fast car is a Porsche GT2.  it has composite carbon ceramic brake rotors.  The rotors have a replacment cost of $5,000, not for a set of four but each!  The brakes on this car are world class incredible.  I can lap the big track at Willow Spring Raceway all day long with no fade, braking from 150 mph on the front straight.  To make use of all of this braking power, and also to put 550 horsepower to the pavement, I have Michelin PS sport cup tires, 245's up front and 315's on the rear axle.  The car has anti-lock hardware and software, but the braking capabilities of this car are so immense, that I have rarely felt the anti-lock engage.  On a wet surface, all of a sudden, all of that braking potential is not usable.

A 3rd component that is a variable in ultimate braking performance, in addition to tires and brakes, is suspension.  Too stiff and the lack of compliance and damping will have the car dancing and tires skipping, too soft and all the weight transfer suddenly and overload the front tires, or the outside tires, or in worst case transfer all weight to the front outside tire.

I think that many blend the concept of braking power and braking feel.  Strong initial "bite" feels powerful to us, power boosted brakes feel strong.  I have been in race cars with brakes that require a lot of leg strength, but clearly can outbrake street cars that just need a tap on the brake pedal.  If you can lock all four wheels, then you have all the braking power you need.  But as the saying goes, "All complex and difficult problems have an easy answer, and that easy answer is wrong."  As our favorite nutcase billionaire, Ross Perot, was fond of saying, "The Devil is in the details" (using a nasally texas accent).

Braking (and acceleration) is too often treated as an on/off switch.  Incremental braking, progessively starting at 1% braking up to 100% and then backing off to 1% take a very educated foot.  If you watch racecars carefully (many spectators line up to watch racecars blast down the straights, but the action is really at the corner entrance and exits)  the drivers that are at the top of the leaderboard are so smooth that you have  a hard time seeing the transistion to braking.  Slower driver tend to slam on the brakes and you can see the cars suddenly dip the front suspension and get out of balance resulting in less precision in setting up for the turn.  There truly is a difference in 75% braking and 74% braking when at the limit trail braking into a fast corner trading off braking traction for cornering traction.

So the driver is the all important 4th variable in braking performance.  When it comes to performance the most critical part in the car in the "Nut" behind the steering wheel.  I try to practice braking skills daily.  After check to see that no one is behind me, and after warning any passengers, I will practice maximum braking at a stop sign or red light in a remote or empty area.  The goal is to stop as quickly as possible with locking up the brakes.  Just like golf, if you don't practice, you will suck at it.  You can have the best brakes in the world, but if you don't know how to best use them, then you wasted your money.  This is why manufacturers have engineered anti-lock brakes in almost all modern car.  Drivers will panic and slam on brakes and the computer will take care of them, no skills required (and all of us should acknowlege that the level of driving skills and attention in this country truly is shockingly horrible).  Get to know how you brakes perform on dry, wet, snowy, clean, dusty, hot, cold conditions.  It may save your life someday.

This is where rear disks are so helpful.  Drums may lock up early, the right rear one stop, then the left rear on the next stop, both on the 3rd stop, then fade and lose power on the next stop, and so on.  For a driver to have confidence, consistency in braking is everything.  Our speedsters have adequate brakes, but just fine for a car with a top speed of 98 mph (per my GPS unit).  If I had a big motor and a 140 mph speedster like some of you folks, I would upgrade wheels, tires, suspension, and brakes.  But I really enjoy the feel of just putting around in my little speedster with 60 year old technology.  It get driven 10 time more often than the GT2.

... and there it is, neatly wrapped up in a nutshell.

BTW, "Pdrvr"-- who are you? You seem like a really good guy to have around. I'd love to address you by name, if you didn't mind horribly.

I second what Stan said.  Who are you?

Troy,

I was only joking and shamelessly plugging our new products.

Can you PM me the best way to get in touch with you, as I have some questions about the Vintage sure wide bodies and someone said you know things....

Thanks

ALB,

The 12.5 disc brake package will fit behind some 16 inch wheels. You would need to take a measurement to know for sure on the wheels you want to run. We do know they will not fit behind a 15 inch wheel. Well at least not with the caliper in place.......

Does that mean a 15" Fuchs will fit over an 11"disc and Wilwood caliper?

Yes

Hi guys.  My name is Young Hong.  I live in Orange County, Peoples Republic of California, living under the regime of Kim Il Moonbeam Brown.  I have a 2008 VS, 1915cc with dual Kadrons, that I bought in November and have been enjoying greatly, at least when I can find it and get it away from my sons, who also love driving it.  I've learned an amazing amount of information from reading this forum and thought it was time that I tried to contribute.  You guys have been so helpful in helping me learn about my VS.

Young--welcome aboard from Dogpatch too. I enjoyed your post and printed it for my reference book.  You know some stuff!

One of the things that hasn't been mentioned is a brake component's ability to absorb and shed heat. Drums are great at absorbing heat, but poor at getting rid of it. In the mid/late '50's when most European car companies were going to disc brakes for competition, Porsche took drum brake development just that little bit further, using aluminum drums (with steel liners), fins on the outside circumference and ducting air for cooling. They did have some success, but soon realized they were at a dead end and made the switch, with discs appearing on the production C series 356's ('63?).

This is where discs shine; while you can use semi-metallic shoes, bigger drum assemblies (type 3) and even duct air through the backing plates to improve braking performance, their limitations at getting rid of heat will eventually rear it's ugly head (with sometimes costly/painful results!). Discs (with wheels with openings designed to move air through them and across the rotors), on the other hand, are much better at shedding heat. The question becomes "how much brake do you need?" In a panic stop from 70mph, a beetle's (a valid comparison as not only are they the source for the drum brakes, they weigh close to the same as most Speedsters) brakes will fade somewhere around 30-40 mph. They also don't have the heat soak/shedding capabilities that repeated braking will demand of the components. The first upgrade is front (Karmann Ghia) discs, and now that same car will panic stop from almost as fast as you can get it. A friend's car loaded down with 800 or so pounds of transmission stuff (he'd found some ZF diffs and other trans bits in Mexico) is the only time I've ever heard of anyone discovering the limitations of the Ghia style front discs. This was a panic stop from a 70 or 75mph- he crested a hill on a Mexican highway and there was an accident involving 2 trucks and he said they simply "went away" at about 35 or 40mph, and some fancy driving (thank goodness for wider wheels/tires and suspension mods) and some luck saved his butt.

For most people in these plastic cars, the Ghia front discs and either beetle or type 3 rear drums and semi-metallic pads will be adequate, and yes, I know rear discs will be better (note that I used the word "adequate"). For those constantly tweaking suspensions and pushing the limits of their higher hp cars, rear discs are a damn good idea. And for those with monster hp and much above 100mph capability, vented (and possibly larger) front discs are not only a good idea, they may very well save your life.... Al

Young- Great post, and welcome to the madness!      

ok this thread has become too technical

A percussive solo followed by a replica speedster... fabricate that.

Braking force is dependent on three things (for a given car/tire): leverage, clamping force, and coefficient of friction. The force of friction is only dependent on the clamping force and the coefficient of friction, it is independent of contact (pad) area. The coefficient of friction is dependent on temperature.

Discs:

Larger diameter = more leverage. The farther out from the axle you get with your caliper/pad, the more leverage you have and thus the more braking force. Like using a breaker bar instead of a normal wrench on a bolt.

Bigger = more thermal mass, room for venting. Better heat absorption and dissipation.

Better materials = better heat absorption and dissipation.

If you can control the heat better, you control the coefficient of friction better. That means the brakes can be used more often and with less fade.

Calipers:

Larger = more piston area. More piston area means more clamping force available against the pads. Piston area is also the first method to set front/rear brake balance.

Pads:

Larger = more area to spread heat load, lower wear from larger contact area (assuming all else equal).

Compound: Different compounds have different coefficient of friction vs temperature curves, you need to choose the one that matches the normal driving style of the car. Street pads often have high CoF at low temperatures but fall off quickly at higher temps. This gives them decent braking ability for the infrequent braking (cold brakes) seen in city/highway driving but are prone to fade when pushed hard. Race pads on the other hand, might have poor CoF at low temps but work well at much higher temps caused by frequent track braking. But even race compounds will fade at high temps, hence the need for huge, vented (even fancy carbon ceramic) discs to control the temps. If fading is a problem in panic stops, try a different pad compound first. Better to have slightly less agressive pads during normal driving than to be plastered on someones back bumper because the brakes faded early.

Yes, I suppose if you can lock up the wheels, you have all the braking power you need. But better brakes means you can keep locking those wheels up long after drum brakes have faded to greasy uselessness.

Well... we are in the "Technical General" section. Perhaps you're looking for the "online banter" section on the Miata site?

.

I have 4 wheel disc brakes on my coupe, and although I don't have anything to compare it with, I think it's overkill. I can stop great, I worry about the guy behind me. Plus the fact that I have semi-metallic pads which tend to squeal. (Has anyone else dealt with this?) If I had it to do over, I'd go with drums on the rear, maybe even 4 wheel drums.

This can go on my list of things I've never heard before, "I just stop too fast".

4-wheel drums? You first.

That was my 930 which had much better brakes than the idiot guy behind me

That's my point.

Despite the better brake than the guy right-behind downside, I'd still opt for above average stopping power. To wit, I just dumped my for wheel drums and shoes for discs and pads (Kevin has them and might make you a deal if you're serious ... they are wide-5 pattern which I will miss).

 What Stan said X2. Remember that every car out there these days has at least front discs; the damage to Doug's 930 was caused by the inattention of the idiot behind him and NOT his car having better brakes. In today's traffic with the speeds people travel on congested roadways (almost everyone following way too close!) and at least front discs being standard equipment on just about every car out there, I don't understand why choosing drums all around in a plastic car with no crash protection would even be considered. It's not just foolish, but downright dangerous. In these cars we need all the help we can get. As for the brake squeal, spring for different pads.  Al  

Pull your pads out and bevel the edges by grinding at a 45 degree angle an 1/8 inch around all of the edges. Then buy some good quality high temp grease and apply it to the metal backing of the pad everywhere it makes contact with the metal of the caliper or brake pad saddles. We use a silver colored grease called anti seeze. The squealing is caused by pad vibration and the metal to metal contact, not the compound or any other wise tell.......

I currently have basic 4 wheel disc brakes on my speedster, and they do a good job coming down from freeway speeds of 60-70, however they do not do very good when trying to bring it down from 100. They over heat and fade like crazy. Hell I turned the rotors blue in less then 50 miles. This is the reason I came out with our vented brakes. While they maybe overkill for most of you, I'll never rear end anyone because of brake fade.

Great advice, Kevin; I had to search back and find it to write it down. As for my advice, I don't know what I was up to that night...