New Brakes

When I first built the Fury I used the standard Escort brakes, discs on the front and drums on the rear. They were adequate since they were designed to stop a small steel bodied saloon. However I wanted to upgrade to discs all round so in 2007 I bought a kit from HiSpec Motorsport. The kit stayed in the box until recently so I unpacked it and dismantled the front hubs.

Everything came apart easily, the new 280mm cross-drilled disc seemed like it wouldn't fit on the back of the hub, but putting the hub in the freezer overnight to 'shrink' it made the disc fit perfectly. The front kit came with an adaptor to fit on to the old caliper mounts with everything reassembled I offered up the new calipers and...... they didn't fit. Long story short, I had been supplied calipers that were a direct replacement for the originals with the original discs! After a lot of correspondence with HiSpec over a few months, I ordered new, correct calipers.

I moved to the back axle. The old drums and back plates were rusty but again came apart easily. However, reassembly of the disc kit proved to be as challenging as the front. The caliper mounting bracket left the calipers at the 4 o'clock position, so I had to re-drill a new set of holes to align with my preferred 3 o'clock orientation. I also painted the calipers red to match the new front calipers.

Next, when I offered up the disc, it wouldn't fit over the hub. The internal diameter of the top-hat profile was 3mm too small. HiSpec recommended I turn the hubs down, but that would leave me with non-standard hubs going forward. After a bit of measuring I figured it would be safe to get 3mm turned off the I.D. of the disc by a local machine shop. With that sorted the discs fitted perfectly.

There's a bit more on the rear brake conversion. I had perhaps naively assumed the escort handbrake mechanism would operate the caliper handbrake, it didn't!. After further correspondence with HiSpec, the calipers were designed to be operated by a Sierra handbrake cable. I ordered one from the UK but on offering it up was really not happy with the whole arrangement.

The Escort cable is a single cable, whereas the Sierra is a dual cable so I would have to make up a new bracket to clamp the cable sleeves where they enter the transmission tunnel. This would also mean opening up the tunnel hole.
The handbrake is only designed to operate a single cable. I would have to shorten and somehow combine the Sierra cables.
The routing of the cable to the caliper looked like it would rub, either on the chassis, or the wheel, or maybe both.
HiSpec no longer offer this caliper and some internet research led me to believe it was basically ineffective. Many users complained that they couldn't get the handbrake to pass the (UK) MOT test. So if I overcame the first 3 concerns, whats to say the result would be a success.

Given all this, I looked at other options. The new HiSpec calipers looked like they should work better and reports were more positive, however the mounting holes were different so they wouldn't fit my brackets. The new bracket for this type caliper has to be welded to the axle. Plus I would be another ~$500 out of pocket. So I started looking into a hydraulic handbrake. Research indicated it is not illegal if you retain the original mechanical handbrake mechanism. After designing a circuit using a master cylinder that is popular with the drifting community. It simply fits in-line with the rear brake line.

I fabricated an actuating arm from the handbrake lever to the new master cylinder that was mounted on the inside of the transmission tunnel.

Lastly, I made new levers to allow the Escort handbrake mechanism to actuate the levers on the calipers mechanically. I will have to see how this gets on during an inspection.

I made a Youtube video of the rear brake conversion that can be seen here :

Rear disc conversion

The front disc upgrade can be seen here :

(not finished yet)