GRM style brake upgrade for my C3...

I would like to upgrade the front calipers. Haven't pulled them to see if they're sleeved and/or upgraded to o-ring style pistons. The Wilwood kits are big money I can't afford. Any suggestions for replacements that I could have brackets made for? Circle track? C5? Anyone done this?

I am tired of the soft pedal and the constant need to bleed them. I've replaced the booster, the Master, the rubber hoses for braided, new rotors and pads and checked the run out so that the rotors aren't pumping the pistons too much as the factory 4 pistons are direct mounted.

I really liked the floating calipers of my VWs. The C5 has floaters. Would it be wrong to convert to these?

Thanks in advance.

Don't know if you'll have the same experience, but I just replaced my rotors and pads on the front of my escort for about 100.00. Didn't want to go as far as to get drilled rotors, but I did get slotted and they work pretty damn well.

Edit: It was an Ebay set.

In reply to vwcorvette:

Think you will have clearance issues unless you go bigger diameter on the wheels.

Slotted rotors are great, but their one downside is that they are a bitch to machine, as you have to re-bevel every edge, thus shortening hte life of the rotor. One real hard sudden stop and they're toast.

Anything more than stock and you will have to upgrade brakes. C5's use a 12 or 13 in rotor up front, and I don't think anything smaller than 17's will fit.

C5 wheels also have a zero offset, and I don't know for sure, but I think you'd need wheel spacers for your C3. It can be done, and is cheaper than a big name kit, but it's stil not nessecarily cheap.

some modern style 12" brakes will fit behind some 15" wheels- i know for a fact that the later C4 12" front brakes fit behind 70's Z/28 wheels, for example.

LS1 (98-02) F body brakes are another option- find someone with a Camaro or Firebird from that era and see if your wheels fit.

I have 93 Sawblades with spacers. Clearance would not be an issue.

What would my concerns be with having adapters made for whatever caliper I chose?

Best choice for material?

When we put Mustang calipers and 240SX rotors on the Lemons Amazon, I was really surprised how easy it was to mix and match brake components. Rockauto has pictures of calipers. Go to cars which have large brakes and look for similar calipers, buy them and then design and build a bracket to mount them.

Do you have the stainless sleeved OEM calipers on your C3? If not, just get those. They will eliminate the need to rebleed your system frequently.

In reply to 93gsxturbo:

Yeah, I am contemplating just this. But the calipers are incredibly heavy. Would they be good for the occasional HPDE or time trial?

Cant comment on the racing, but plenty of C3s were tracked before nice light billet monoblock calipers were available. Good fresh fluid, good pads, standard story.

On my friend's C3, bad rear wheel bearings were leading to excessive rotor runout, causing the brakes to eventually need to be rebled, about every time he would drive it more than an hour. We figured it was a combination of the pulsing and non-sleeved calipers with small pits. He had the rotors cut and new bearings installed and the problem went away. You might want to measure rotor and wheel bearing runout and make sure its to the small end of spec.

Bearings in the rear done last year. Both within spec. One closer to min than the other. Mayhaps I should have the rotors cut on the car. Gotta check out if my calipers are sleeved and or converted to o-ring pistons.