Anyone have any real world experience with the TBM Brake Kits? Building a new car (Dragster) and looking at all options. Have ran Mark Williams for years on several other cars and not sure if there is anything better. Thanks. Kevin

I love mine. Calipers and pads are what im using……

MW was all I ever run till locking up issues…TBM on everything from now on

I run TBM pads with MW Caliper and rotors and have been very happy

Haven't talked to a single person who doesn't love them. Including my daughter

Looks like you can adjust the rotor to caliper alignment with where you bolt the rotor on
Brilliance

Looks like TBM and Mark Williams that both are same price.
The early TBM brakes I thought had one piece solid steel U shaped caliper frame that should be stronger and less flex than bolt together aluminum.
It appears these are now 2 piece aluminum like most of the others?

quote:

Originally posted by Curly1:
Looks like TBM and Mark Williams that both are same price.
The early TBM brakes I thought had one piece solid steel U shaped caliper frame that should be stronger and less flex than bolt together aluminum.
It appears these are now 2 piece aluminum like most of the others?

Calipers and brackets are made from steel.

I really loved my old Lamb brakes but Roger refused to make a brake kit for my Santhuff struts, so I went with TBM. Working well.

My first experience with TBM was a number of years ago, back before they really got popular in drag racing. Customer supplied them for his rebuild. Car was completed, he went to a 1/4 mile event and ran 200 mph and his dual chutes came off the car and he still managed to stop his 3000+ lb car. Damn chute anchor was the only part of the build we didn't redo. lol

We have ran their pads for several years with great success. New car on the jig table will have all of their hardware on this build.

Yes - adjustable alignment rotors.

Calipers are Aluminum with SS connectors. Nickel plated.

Caliper brackets are steel, but per Doug Cook will be going to aluminum with steel threaded inserts as I also recommended.

They also have a 1/2" rotor option for those who really like to ride the pedal.

quote:

Originally posted by Big Steve:
I run TBM pads with MW Caliper and rotors and have been very happy

Ya got a part number for those pads Steve?

quote:

Originally posted by Greg Kelley:

quote:

Originally posted by Big Steve:
I run TBM pads with MW Caliper and rotors and have been very happy

Ya got a part number for those pads Steve?

Here ya go. Price is about $40 higher now since Motion bought them and they moved to Florida

They have a new pad we've went to on the dragsters.

6-0102W

quote:

Originally posted by DragRaceResults:
They have a new pad we've went to on the dragsters.

6-0102W

Thats F3 #1 compound. Its been around several years

Correct - New might have been the wrong wording. They just didn't start out suggesting it for the dragsters.

SL...

Those of you running the TBM brakes, what kind of pad life are you getting and which pad? I am mainly interested in the 1/8 mile bracket cars. My new to me car came with Wilwood calipers and rotors and I put carbon Lorraine pads on. I run an 1/8 mile track with shortish shutdown at 147-150 and used those pads up in 60-70 passes. Staging with them was fantastic and they stopped well, but at $300 every time you have to change pads it wouldn’t take long to pay for new better brakes.

Only ran the soft pads, burnt through them in about 150 passes, mostly 1/4 mile tracks going 160 1/8th but the 6-0102W is suppose to be way better.

yes I'm finishing up mine as we speak.

Have had TBM rear on for a minute. Did the fronts the other day, haven't been to the track yet.

They are a little easier to set up than Aerospace in my opinion. Much better quality. TBM's customer service is top notch.

In my case, my car uses a version of the Pinto/Mustang II front end so that's the kit I had to get. The instructions that were sent with the kit sucked. Horrible. Basically says "install this part and then the next until you're done". Anyway I have been calling TBM's phone about a couple issues that I was unclear on and they were awesome to deal with. Even via email (with pics) they have been great. There is zero drag with this kit, front and rear. I use F2 on the rear and F1 on the front. The Aerospace calipers, they'd get stuck often and out of nowhere. They came off obviously, tired of dealing with em and their "customer service". I mean they answered the phone but had no answer to my issue with them sticking other than "you didn't properly shim them". Same answer every time (and mind you they were shimmed to within .001" of square which is way closer than you can get with their shim kit). As far as how they work, the TBM's work great. The do not grab hard initially but holding steady force on the pedal, you can feel them start to bite, then they bit harder and harder and harder the hotter they get. On a short shutdown I usually have to let up on the pedal a little. This is with just the rear TBM, and aerospace front. The aerospace front brakes typically needed a lot more pedal pressure because the pads kind of sucked (they were the original pads-from 2010!). I am footbraking and staging with the TBM brakes on the rear is much easier than it was with aerospace, they don't "grab" when cold so you can vary the pedal pressure such that it will just creep into the beam without it "jumping" into the beam. TBM pad life? Can't speak for it since I haven't put much time on them yet but so far so good.

I worked closely with TBM on several occasions. One thing to be aware of is TBM brake kits require a much smaller bore master cylinder to achieve the proper caliper pressure.

For example my Lamb brakes Roger wanted a 2 1/8" bore MC.

On the TBM's they will likely tell you no bigger than 15/16" on a tandem MC and with me using dual singles, I'm using 3/4" bore.

The reason for this is the TBM caliper has a slightly larger piston compared to other manufacturers.

all manufacturers will tell you x size master cylinder. But in all actuality, it's a generality-not knowing what your pedal ratio is. That plays heavily into the bore size that you choose. A 7:1 pedal ratio might get away with 1" bore, if you have a 5.5:1 pedal, you might not appreciate a 1" bore-may have to drop to 3/4". OR change the pedal.

Personal preference kind of plays in too. That's something else that footbrake guys can do is mess with the braking system, helps "change" the reaction time a tiny bit; depending on the driver. It's a lot easier to change the car than it is to change the driver...