It also depends on brake plans. Very very few 18"s will fit 6-pot brembos if you go that wsy. But they all will fit 4-pot.

 

Is there really any need for the 6-piston Brembos, with the bigger rotors? Seems like the 4-pot with the 14" rotors work fine on these cars.

 

I still am using oem 4-pot sonyes they are very capable. No real need for bigger, I prefer the path of 2-piece rotors and Ti shields with cooling and good pads. Works just fine for me!

 

Project rear diff cooler is underway

Should wrap it up tomorrow. I'll post a few more pics

 

No plans currently to go with the 6 pot calipers. The factory 4 pot Brembos are enough for me.

 

What were the deciding factors in adding the rear diff cooler?

 

The third time I blew the rear axle seal was my deciding point. Getting too hot at the track so it's a good durability mod

 

How does heat lead to a blown seal? I realize heat can increase pressure, but the rear ends are vented to relieve pressure.

 

I'm assuming the seal is rubber or silicone of some sort, as it heats it becomes less stiff and it'll eventually let loose. Plus these cars run the diff up in temp quickly which shortens fluid life. Cooler is better

 

Wired in my accusump and diff cooler pump / fan... now I can pressurize the engine oil before starting. Doing all the cooling and durability upgrades... tranny cooler and external oil cooler coming over the winter

 

Thank you for the additional explanation. That makes sense that the heat degrades the seals over time and they fail. I wasn't thinking about the effects of heat over time.

 

I could be wrong, the above is my assumption.

Worth noting, the drivers seal is the one that has failed and it's on clockwise tracks. I think that supports my theory that the seal sees stress and with high heat it loses the ability to seal properly

We shall see if my cooler setup helps!

 

All installed. Just have to tidy things up a bit and go drive.

Plan is to run a session with it off, grab some IR gun temps, then repeat with it running. Should be 20-30F cooler

 

And the toggles for it and the accusump!

 

That looks really good. It will be interesting to see how much cooler it actually runs and how much longer the axle seals last.

 

Installed a Steeda X-brace and pan hard bar brace this afternoon. They weren't in my plans for this summer, but when I saw the labor day sale prices I decided to move them up my list. The X-brace is bolted in for now. I plan to have it welded in place when I find someone that I trust to do the job.

 

Nice, what's the benefit of the panhard brace? Something I never considered.

 

It is supposed to stiffen the pan hard bar mount which is prone to under loading/deflection. It also provides some additional chassis stiffness in the rear. The stock brace, or lateral stiffner in Ford speaks is made of stamped sheet metal and is pretty flimsy. The Steeda brace is made from 4130 chromoly tubing. I am not sure how much of a difference it is going to make, but it was only $80 on the labor day sale, so I figured why not.

 

Gotcha, very cool

 

Measured some differential temps today at my track day... diff external find are around 175, fwd diff area (black) is 190, radiator inlet is around 175, outlet is 150. So cooling at least 25F.