9 replies to this topic

[PuddleSkipper]

Hey guys, need some advice on brakes............I know I've read on here that you can swap 88-91 civic SI brake calipers to the 1G/3G and it is supposed to be a performance upgrade. I have also read that if you want to run the HF drums that you can swap to the EF backing plates...............so one would conclude that both the fronts and the back brakes are a direct complete bolt on swap right??? As far as I could tell there is no difference between 88-91 SI brake calipers and the ones that came on my 4DR LX, they are the same part # on the Majestic Honda website. I have a buddy with a 1G whose short on money now and since I had these laying around and I had just did a brake job on my car in Oct before I did an EX front/DA rear brake swap in Feb, I thought I'd hook him up with my new/old stock set up. The calipers/rotors bolted up just fine, however, once we actually drove the car there was a grinding noise coming from the front that was not heard until after the brake swap. Whenever we turned a hard left and a hard right is when this noise occured. When we jacked the car up, turned the front wheels, and spun the tires there was no abnormal noise, only when the tire was on and riding on the ground. Is it supposed to be shimmed or something? Also the EF backing plates definitely did not fit, so that was a total myth. The top two holes line up while the bottom ones would have to be redrilled because they are too far off. The EF guts fit fine, the EF wheel cylinder fit fine, was a pain to thread the brake line into it but that is not unusual, and the EF drum fit just fine. That would lead me to conclude that the HF drum would fit the stock 1G backing plates just fine, but I have not actually tried this. So I guess I'm asking if anyone has actually used EF rotors/calipers on the front and if there was anything they needed to do to make them work? or if there is something else to suspect for the grinding noise? Thanks for your help in advance.

[3rd gen sinner]

From what I remember during my research is that any newer style caliper will require some material to be ground off the mounting bracket to center the bracket over the rotor. Some have also installed the correct thickness shim between the rotor and hub.
For the grinding noise, it could be the rotor is not centered and a slight bearing deflection due to side load could cause the rotor to rub on the bracket.

[PowerWheels86]

i had a similar situation when i threw on my ED7 calipers... but the issue wasn't the calipers themselves, it was the wheels, grinding against the brake hose bolt that is mounted on the strut... i guess the different sized caliper pulled the wheel in closer to the strut causing it to grind... check against the wheels... also, i used a zip tie to hold the brake line instead of the bolt... 

[GeezRX]

Another possibility is...when I put 89 Civic calipers and rotors onto my 86 Civic Si hatch I picked up a nasty sound on turns and some bumps...looked and looked trying to solve this until one day I noticed a very slight chamfer on the very outer edge of the rotors and a corresponding mark on the lower edge of the ball joints on the LCA's. It's very hard to see but once found it made perfect sense what was making the noise. I later found posts alluding to the fact that certain ball joint brands could cause this in conjunction with a brake upgrade. 

 

Skip

[PuddleSkipper]

Thanks guys, I'll check all your suggestions next week when I go down again to work on it. 

 

Skip - did you have to shim anything to get them to work? or did the rotor ride pretty centered?

[GeezRX]

Skip - did you have to shim anything to get them to work? or did the rotor ride pretty centered?
[/quote]

No actual measuring done but by eyeball the rotors look perfectly centered.

Skip

[PuddleSkipper]

Sweet! Thanks Skip! Bled the brakes with the tires on and didn't think about checking the clearance once they were bled. Didn't think we'd run into the grindage issue either though.

[Richardcoto452th]

I used 91 civic sedan brakes for the front and it's all plug and play. The grinding you have is from the lca making contact with the rotor. sorry Little late.

[PuddleSkipper]

No problem, thanks for the reply! I haven't had a chance to go back down and work on it, but that seems to make the most sense. I was stumped because everytime we jacked it up and rotated the tire both directions it spun smoothly. It was only when riding on the suspension when we heard grindage.

[GeezRX]

No problem, thanks for the reply! I haven't had a chance to go back down and work on it, but that seems to make the most sense. I was stumped because everytime we jacked it up and rotated the tire both directions it spun smoothly. It was only when riding on the suspension when we heard grindage.

Yep, that's it man...same thing I did trying to find the issue. I added wheel spacers to no avail and on multiple occasions jacked it up varying amounts and twisted/turned stuff and even turned things with it on the ground while watching (with an assistant) and found nothing. I saw a previous post about the LCA/rotor issue with brake upgrades just in passing and when I checked that specifically, found the minute indication of "rubbage". I actually let this slide thinking it would "fix" itself until I recently started to balance the front/rear suspension height with the torsion bar adjustment bolts and BOY did the noise increase along with the rough chamfer being ground on the rotors, especially the passenger side! Anyway, with much trepidation , a few days ago I forced myself to break out the grinder and judiciously remove a small amount of material from the edge of the ball joint housings and clean up the chamfers on the inside edges of the rotors and...no more noise...period! Remove as little as possible and do it along the arc that the rotor swings as the wheel turns lock to lock and if you have the luxury...remove the brake dust shield while doing it...I didn't, which made it more difficult. I was VERY concerned about cutting into the ball joint "socket" so....best of luck with it!

 

Skip