hawkeye18

Stopping distances (on the street) are purely a function of tires. The 3 feet is explained by the use of summer rubber on the brembo package vice AS tires on the non-brembo.

Front brakes off a '92 Tempo, applied with sufficient violence, will lock up the front wheels of a mustang.

The difference is in distances after the 10th or 12th successive 60-0 stop (i.e. on a track). If the Brembos are sufficiently well engineered, the 10th time in a row, the braking distances should be close enough to 102 feet so as to be negligible (~110-115ft, maybe). The standard brakes, OTOH, will likely stop the car in about 180-200 feet, as the brakes will be fried by that point.

So what it basically boils down to (no pun intended) is, you don't buy brembos to stop faster the first time. You buy brembos to continue stopping fast on the 13th lap in a row.

Or to look *****in', and to be able to say you got Brembos on the car. I'm not gonna lie, that's why I got them. But I'm honest with myself; a lot of people aren't.

Edit: Oh, almost forgot another benefit of the Brembos: feel. This is true of any brake setup with more pistons than its comparison, though. The number of pistons doesn't make a **** bit of difference in how heavily it clamps the pads against the rotor (again, see '92 Tempo brakes), but they do make a big difference in how well you can modulate said clamping force. In that same vein, any two-piston setup (as is the standard setup for mustangs) will feel better than a one-piston setup. Also, more pistons tend to give more even pad wear, but that's a tertiary benefit, if any at all.

2010MustangGT

^^ Preach!

Overboost

Bingo!

I bought the BBP for several reasons. I plan on tracking the car in some capacity, whether it be autocross, HPDEs, or something else. Second, I do like the wheels, and, of the available options, think are the best looking. Lastly, of the offered wheels, they are the widest available option. Putting rubber on the road aides in handling, so this seemed like a no-brainer for me.

After driving with them now for over a week, they are night & day vs. my Speed6 brakes, even on equivalently sticky tires (Bridgestone Potenza RE050As vs. Pirelli PZero Neros). The large single piston brakes on the 6 didn't have the responsive pedal feel that the Brembo's do, despite being almost the same size (~.5" difference in rotor diameter IIRC).

I'll add the brake cooling and take it on the track and see how she does. I personally think the track/performance options are worth it on a car like this.

OAC_Sparky

If you're addressing me you're preaching to the choir.

My post was in response to another poster, alluding to 3' not making a difference. Depending on the circumstance, it does. Been a victim of someone else wishing they had another 3' of stopping distance. That $1600 not spent ended up costing the insurance company $13,000 in damage.

2010MustangGT

^^ If you're ever in the circumstance where you need to stop sooner. That's YOUR bad. Driver error. Not the brakes. Any driver will allot himself the proper driving distance and be able to judge accordingly.

granted that everything is keep to spec and the brakes are sound (not heavily worn). Most rear end collisions aren't due to brakes... it's due to following too close, going to fast, or poor judgment (usually a combo of sorts.)


The human eye can't discern when something is 15ft away as opposed to 18ft away let alone 105ft vs 108ft.

OAC_Sparky

If you've never made an error in judgement while driving, you should try walking on water or turning water to wine.

There have been two incidents in over 25 years of driving where I've hit someone from behind -- one was on wet leaves in the fall when the weather was hovering around freezing, I was driving a pickup and wasn't intentionally following too closely. Yes technically it was my fault but at the same time you don't expect to slide 200' when driving 30MPH either, in any normal circumstance. The other was when we were all doing 65MPH, when a person panic-stopped in the passing lane (on our equivalant) of the Interstate. I had to panic stop stand on the brakes, stopped 5' short only to have the car behind me (who couldn't see around me and wasn't tailgating either) bury her front end under the back bumper of my truck pushing me into the car in front of me. Know how I know she wasn't tailgating? I knew where she was in my rear-view mirror; it was my wife in my OTHER car.

But as for the Brembos, the real benefit I've noticed with better brakes on my other car is less brake fade, like a previous poster said, it's not the one panic stop it's the 12th lap at the track or the bottom of a long steep grade.

Big Poppa

Get the BBP, or at least add a big brake package once you get the car. Everybody trying to make HP but ya need to stop the thing once you get it going. Three feet saves a lot of sheetmetal.

hawkeye18

Um... as I said (at length) earlier, in a highway situation it's not the brakes that will stop your car faster, it's the tires.

If all you're looking for is the shortest 60-0 distance for one panic stop, just get some really sticky summer tires and you'll have it down under 100 feet. Even tiny little 8" rotors with single-piston calipers will impart sufficient force to lock up the wheels... once.

Digital_Synapse

3 feet? If you only intend to drive in areas where you wont do repeated heavy braking. Now, I'm not talking about tracking the car, with repeated 150+mph stops, that requires some serious modding, but repeated 135-90mph braking, they make a huge difference. I used to take my last Mustang, '05 GT with Hawk Pads on stock rotors, out to my stomping grounds in the hill country and I couldn't push the car too hard (100-65) because brake fade would scare the poo out of me. 5min of heavy stopping and we were fading pretty hard.

Now, I took my '11 Brembo with stock brakes out to the same area and I was pushing her hard for 30+min with (130-85) heavy braking and she never faulted. I love this car.

http://youtu.be/nDkNN0-pQXE?hd=1

I don't know why it doesn't look fast here, looked pretty fast in real life, lol. About 120-90 in this vid. 90 on the turns, 120 in the straights.

825LTRGT

The -3 ft comes from the MT test.

I'm sure they are good but I don't repeatedly brake from 100-0, for me, I don't think it's worth it. If it was a significant difference, I would go for it. The extend of my track braking is 1/4 mile at a time.

Had one instance where I popped someone from the rear. That was 22 years ago and better brakes wouldn't have made a difference. I learned from that mistake. Knock on wood!!

In my case, all of this is bench racing and magazine test #'s. No actual personal experience with a Brembo car. The '11's I have driven have all been std brakes. They worked well. So I'll take your word for it.

To someone who road races, that is a different story. On the street, I don't know if $1800 is worth it.

Driver72

First, if I'm not mistaken the test by Motor Trend with the 3 feet difference was done on two completely different days.

I'd put good money on a bet that if you take 5 BBP GT's and 5 regular and take them to a test site and do braking tests that on average the stopping distance benefit from the BBP cars will be 7-8 feet.
Do the test back to back to back on the same cars and by the 4th or 5th 60-0 stopping test the average distance will increase to 15+ feet.

As so many, including myself have said over and over, the Brembo brake package is a STEAL.
It is a literal bargain, and quite frankly it's nearly FREE.
How do I consider a package that cost $1695 nearly free?

Well I sold my Brembo Brake package wheels and tires for $1,550.
You order the optional 19" wheels and tires and you get wheels that are 2-3 lbs heavier each and still get All Season tires. Those are a $995 option from the factory, that means you'll be lucky to be able to sell them for $750.
The 18" wheels and tires you may get $600.

The Brembo brake package is more than just the brakes and wheels/tires too.

But if you are planning on getting aftermarket wheels/tires anyway, get the Brembo brake package.
You pay $1,695 more for it and can sell the wheels and tires for $1,500.
So your out of pocket cost is about $195 for BREMBO BRAKES for s--t sake.
The package is a no brainer to start with, but if you plan on going aftermarket on your wheels and tires anyway, I think an unborn fetus would know $195 for the Brembo brakes and the ECU tuning, suspension/chassis/etc upgrades are just a steal.

Like someone above stated, stop trying to talk yourself out of getting them, you know you want them and they are truly a bargain option.

xkoote

That;s the exact reason I'm getting them. You can sell them off and reuse the tires if you wanted on your new wheels. Can't for the 18's. Plus the tuning and strut brace. But it's just not an issue of trying to talk oneself out of it. It's a financial decision as well and the above post, together with the beautiful stock brembo wheels allow for more options on the long run.

Thanks to all of you.

908ssp

The brakes are nice very nice but if you want to drop your car the springs get replaced and in my opinion you should have shocks designed for the lower springs. The trailing arms need replacing, the panhard rod needs replacing, the strut tower brace is a joke. The wheels are too small and the tires are too hard. So I am not sure what you're getting for $1600. Now if you can and do sell off the stock stuff and get the brakes you're golden.

Lancel

Mod your car how you like it, but I for one still consider the Brembo package a pretty good deal given the cost of the rims/tires. Plus I don't know about the rest of you but I think the Brembo rims look the best of all the stock rims, but that's just me. As for the rest, it's still stiffer than any car I've ever driven before. Granted I really haven't driven very many cars.

m4a1mustang

It's a stiff car. Stiffer than my sport-package 370Z, which I found pretty interesting!

falhulk

Drive a Brembo car and a non Brembo car back to back. The non brembo cars are floaty and dont feel nearly as good. Thats all it took for me to know I chose correctly.

Overboost

Yeah, this Mustang stock is stiffer than my full suspension I had on my Speed6.

20115.0

for my 05 GT i bought a pair of USED brembos/with the rotors for $1000. They were GT500 take offs. These are brand new, come with the car, come with better wheels and tires, along with plenty of other upgrades over a non-BBP car. For me the brembo package was a no-brainer. Worth every penny to me.

m4a1mustang

Yup, you have an AWESOME package straight from the factory with the BBP, and even if you want to upgrade suspension/wheels later, you can get a lot of that money back by selling the BBP wheels/tires.

VALCAD

Not to mention, the comparo with the M3 was a stock BBP car, if I am not mistaken, and it matched / beat / or was kissing the bumper on the M3 all day long. No regrets if you get the BBP. Looks, performance and bargain - YEAH BABY!!! Yeah!!! [in the voice of Austin Powers, Baby]