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Thu Jul 02, 2020 4:11 pm

I know this is a topic that has been pretty well covered but I haven’t seen anything that answers what I’m about to ask.

It would appear that one could just bolt G60 calipers to the outside face of early model spindles? The spindles were already threaded and the G60 calipers are not.

In the photo I’ve attached someone has put through bolts and then used either nylon s or whatnot on the inboard side. Why couldn’t one just use the threaded portion of the pre 86’ spindle and just bolt the carrier on. I understand you have to put the rotor and carrier on at the same time so using a wrench would be tedious but it’s a Westy.

Thanks folks.

Thu Jul 02, 2020 5:01 pm

here's another loaded question. what's wrong with the brakes it came with?

Thu Jul 02, 2020 5:31 pm

Fair enough question.

I have 15” BFG KO2 tires. I’m often either headed out to the outer banks or to the mountains loaded with all kinds of stuff. I’m also running a Subaru conversion. For a while this thing was my daily driver, I want it to be as capable as possible.

When I put the bigger tires on the first thing I noticed was how much better it handled, the second thing was how poorly it stopped.

I’ve flushed the whole system with fresh fluid and that did improve quality. I do know that a bigger rotor and more braking surface will help me stop. I work as a mechanic for a living so the idea of using affordable off the shelf parts and a little bit of machine work to have better stopping power sounds great.

Thu Jul 02, 2020 7:57 pm

I see, I thought you were running stock.
The weak point is the rears. the self- adjusters don't work very well.
if you haven't adjusted those you may be doing most of the stopping using the fronts. You get em adjusted right, it's stop just fine.

Fri Jul 03, 2020 3:53 am

I also rebuilt the rears two years ago and adjusted them pretty good. I fought the rears on my last van.

Bigger wheels are going to create a longer torque arm for the brakes to counter.

The van stops as it should, but our vans are heavy. Exploring steep Appalachian gravel roads can be sketchy, they’re steep! On my last van I had an “interesting” experience due to brake fade on a long descent, trying to never encounter that again.