Big Brake Master Upgrade, Cheap and Easy

Hey guys, I know I have been a bit distant of late, but wanted to update on a project that I have been working on with Tim.   We did a complete Grand Am brake upgrade on his car a couple months back and although the car stopped all well and good, you really noticed the extra pedal travel, almost felt like you were going 1/2 way to the floor just to apply the brakes.  I spec'd out the big bore master for him at Lordco before I left for Oregon and when I got back he had all the parts ready for install.

       Today thanks to the loan of Brian's power bleeder, we did the swap to the new big more brake master.  Honestly I have bled out dozens of cars, driven countless different brake options on Fiero's and never in my life have I seen this much of a drastic change in braking.  The pedal is right dead at the top.  I doubt you move the pedal even an inch from the top to get the car to apply the brakes. 

The big bore master is available at Lordco for about 40 bucks.  Here are the install pics.

Old Master drained of fluid.

Step one, drain it, and remove it.

New big bore master

Remove 2 hoses and 2 nuts and the old master pops off, takes about 5mins. The lines were 14mm (odd size I know)

Now just pop the old resiouver off of the old master and pop it onto the new master.  It just snaps on and off, I used a large flat pry bar.

Poof like magic.

Now attach power bleeder / bleed like normal with a helper.  Instead of using the chains that come with Brian's kit I chose to use 2 larger C Clamps. (One of them Brian provided the 2nd I had on hand)  The C Clamp method proved quick and easy and worked like a charm.

Grand Am Front brakes

Better shot of Grand Am Rotors.

I apologize I did not get a shot of the installed master in the car however it looks exactly the same as the Fiero one.

    We jacked the car up and cracked the bleeder on all 4 wheels, moving about 1.5 liters of fluid through the entire system to make sure everything was clean and free of air.  Put the car back on the ground and took it for a test drive.  The entire procedure took less than an hour and the brakes are amazing.  

I'll get the receipt from Tim and post up the exact part numbers and prices later tonight.

However for the most part this has been an easy and cheap upgrade, especially if you have Grand Am calipers on your car.

Oh and pedal effort, which I was expecting to be more, due to the larger bore master honestly felt unchanged, even though I know it had to have gotten stiffer I could not feel it in my foot.

Yep pumped it to 10 initially and later moved to 15psi and would let it work down to 10 then pump back up to 15psi. 

Thanks again for the loan of it, it worked out really well.