Celica Forums General Discussion Exterior Best way to fix my ghey Celica brakes?

I hate to say it but it feels to me like the braking of my stock 04 w/drums in the back simply sucks donkey balls.

All I can say is "spongy". I step on the pedal, I don't get "stopping power" I get "mush" if you catch my drift. Will rear rotors fix this? I'm sorry, but the 2000 Cougar I just got rid of had discs all the way around (weight>3000 lbs) and stopped way, and I mean way better than my Celi does.

Would it be more improvement I'm sure to go with rotors in the rear before going with larer rotors in the front? Cross drilled and slotted is mostly for heat dissapation rather than power, correct?

Anyone have a ballpark on what ditching my drums in the back is going to run me? Which would be cheaper vs. improvement, larger front rotors or adding rears? TIA for the advice guys!

Its at least a thousand maybe more to change the rears to discs since you gotta buy and install a bunch of equipment. Just get a big brake kit for the front from trd.

How many miles you got on the car? You may just need to get a brake job done. A rear disc brake conversion is costly and will not really give better braking. More fer looks IMO.

in my opinion, a big brake kit for your front will be cheaper than replacing your rears to rotors (name brand big brake kits from the likes of aem cost about 4k..but some lesser brands offer them for about 1k)

slotted & drilled discs significantly lessen your stopping distance. it does have a heat dissapation advantage, but being drilled makes the discs more textured (obviously) and this texture allows for improved grip from your pads...so it does have some sort of 'power' advantage if you want to call it that. (the brakes don't grip more powerfully, they just grip better).

he has an '04 celica so i doubt the pads are his problem (although they may be if he abuses his brakes badly)

slotted/drilled rotors make the car have less stopping power, Caleb.

The decreased surface area means less contact with the pad, and thus more stopping ditance.

However, over long, hard, repeated stops, these slots/drills will allow the gasses to escape from under the pad, lessening the affect of brake fade.

On a Celica, unless you autox, the upgraded rotors are just for looks.

What you need on your 2004 GT are some decent pads/shoes.

buy a new set of rotors ($44 is worth not having rust) and some good pads. TRD, EBC, Hawk.

As for the shoes, not many companies make high Performance shoes, but you can do better than OEM.

^^ wasnt aware of that, thanks for the headsup jameson

i always learned it was a friction thing. the holes acted the same as bumps would and that created more 'grip' (and friction) which stopped the car in shorter distances.

Thats what it would seem like, but actually it means less surface srea.

Sure, they are great when you ride the breaks for a long time, and you get serious fade, but most people never do that

best way= Rear disk conversion, and then upgrading to Brembo (NOT AEM!!) big brakes... 13 something inches up front, 11 something inches in back, 6 piston front calipers, 4 fiston rear calipers

That would be an awesome brake setup (and the same one that my car will have when i make my first million )

have you had recent work on your brakes..? because by the way you are describing the "spongy" feeling that usually means there is air or water in you brake lines and you need to get em bled...

thats just from what i know about cars...

yep, BREMBO is the best stop stuff out there.

Wow, thanks tons for all the replies everyone.

I realize no one knows my situation, but $1,000 to fix what I'm not liking about these brakes is plenty affordable.

Car has just about 2,000 miles on it and I've only owned it... hell, not even a month yet. And of course I've had no work done on the brakes.

So rear rotors isn't the golden key then? Most reasonable sounding advice I heard was to replace the front rotors/pads and redo the back shoes.

Would steel brake lines help? Is it noticeable enough to be worth doing on top of what I'm going to do anyway?

Brake lines would get better response and you could probably get rid of some of that spongy feeling with them.