Disc brake conversion (70 Dart)
Actually you didn't do any math. You just looked up piston area. Which shows your limited knowledge of how brake calipers are designed.
The problem with single piston brake calipers, slides and bushing mounts, is under braking the pads can flex and produce uneven friction coupling on the face of the brake rotor. Which causes uneven wear or tapering,noise, vibration; or all of those.. And if that's the case, it doesn't really matter what size the pads are. If they have a tendency to not perform properly, your braking force calculations can really only use the diameter of the caliper piston and not the pad area. Yes, the larger pad can absorb more initial thermal heat shock, but that's about it. The reason why multi piston brake calipers sometimes don't have large brake pads is because the manufactures are trying to eliminate pad flex that produces uneven wear,pad tapering and heat. Plus if they can achieve a more desirable "even" brake pad wear with a multi piston design and a smaller pad. The benefits of a larger brake pad's thermal shock heat absorbing is really has no benefit if the brake pad is being pushed into the rotor unevenly or the pad flexes even just a little outside the caliper piston diameter.
And usually modern multi piston calipers have more aggressive piston seals to pull the pads back off the rotors when the driver releases the brake pedal. Why? To produce less heat because your pad is dragging on the rotor after braking. Dummy.
Those old designed brake calipers when worn just don't perform great, they get by. They flex, they quit sliding, rotating on worn parts and a whole bunch of other problems.
I have awesome pictures of Brembo and Baer testing prototype ZR1 and CTS-V calipers over base model calipers on our 500 HP brake dyno at work. You can't beat the even clamping force of a multi-piston caliper and it's repeatability. Even under extreme temperatures. That's a fact.
Willwood, Baer, Brembo all base the number of pistons, piston size and pad size based of vehicle weight and what stopping force is needed. Usually you don't need 6 or 8 piston calipers on and old car. But those do produce a more even clamping force and better wear when designed for that application.
Actualy, I
DID do math, because you can't look up the piston and pad areas for the Mopar parts. :p
As far as my "limited" knowledge of caliper design, you better read my post again. I clearly stated that the multi-piston, fixed calipers were more efficient. The 2.6" piston Mopar calipers are 10% larger in piston area, the 2.75" piston calipers are 23.4% larger in piston area. Is it possible that the Mopar floating calipers lose 10% more braking force because of their design compared to the Wilwoods? Sure, that's totally reasonable. Is it possible that they lose 23.4% of the braking force generated compared to the Wilwoods? I think that's unlikely. Especially with the larger pad area. Sure, they're less efficient, but the generate significantly more braking force. All of which I mentioned in my post, if you actually read it instead of just disagreeing with me. Given how much more force the Mopar calipers generate, I don't think it's a slam dunk at all that the Wilwoods still transmit more braking force. And even if they do, it wouldn't be by a lot. Meaning, you're spending a ton of extra money for little gain.
The Wilwood brakes in question, Dynalites, didn't even come with outer seals just a few years ago. I had a set, I sold them because I didn't want to run calipers without outer seals on the street. Now, the Dynalites have been redesigned since then and have seals now to mirror other street going multi-piston calipers, but how well they pull the pistons back is something you'd have to test. I assume you haven't, since you post lacks any specific details and just deals in vague generalities. You make it sound like the 73+ Mopar calipers will drag the pads all the time, which isn't true. They get knocked back just like any other pad. I put 60k miles on the last set of pads I ran on my Challenger, I can't imagine they were dragging all that much. Heck I'm still using the rotors, and I never had an issue with brake fade. The pads were worn quite evenly as well, as have all the other pads I've changed out of 73+ mopar calipers.
The Dynalites are only 4 piston calipers too, not like the Baer's, Brembo's, or ZR1, etc calipers you mention. They may lose less braking force to flex than the Mopars, but they don't transmit 100% either.
So, same standard applies to you as stroked340. Let's see the numbers that show that the 73+ Mopar calipers lose more than 24% of the braking force they generate when compared to the Wilwoods. Otherwise you're just speculating, and I think the difference between the two calipers is small enough that the Wilwoods aren't worth the price compared to their performance.
