Soarer hydro not as good as i had expected - any advice?

stacky

stacky

Family 4door drifter
Used to drifting with stock handbrakes in Altezza's, R33's and Soarer's (all drum/shoe type systems which have always worked really well until the shoes wear).

Fitted a hydro (0.625" cylinder and a 300mm verticle wand) to my soarer last week and went drifting over the weekend. It sucked! I ended up using the hydro for the first 25% of the day and the stock handbrake for the remaining 75% of the day!!

The system is 100% bled and the hydro gets firm very very quickly, but i'm nearly hanging off the thing before it will lock.

What's the fix? Is this normal with Soarer's? Do people upgrade the rear calipers and discs? would a new set of EBC pad make a big enough differance?

Another thing is... i always see stupidly high hydro wands on drift days (like 600mm long), i always thought it was just for show...... but is the extra leverage needed? I was going to extend my wand by 200mm next weekend to see if it helps - but i dont want to risk bending or breaking something.

Any thoughts?
 
I always use oem compound rear pads as they have a lower temp bite point over some track type pad and they are usually like 20 pounds. never had a hydro myself but that's what I use on the oem handbrake to make it bite better
 
stacky said:
Used to drifting with stock handbrakes in Altezza's, R33's and Soarer's (all drum/shoe type systems which have always worked really well until the shoes wear).

Fitted a hydro (0.625" cylinder and a 300mm verticle wand) to my soarer last week and went drifting over the weekend. It sucked! I ended up using the hydro for the first 25% of the day and the stock handbrake for the remaining 75% of the day!!

The system is 100% bled and the hydro gets firm very very quickly, but i'm nearly hanging off the thing before it will lock.

What's the fix? Is this normal with Soarer's? Do people upgrade the rear calipers and discs? would a new set of EBC pad make a big enough differance?

Another thing is... i always see stupidly high hydro wands on drift days (like 600mm long), i always thought it was just for show...... but is the extra leverage needed? I was going to extend my wand by 200mm next weekend to see if it helps - but i dont want to risk bending or breaking something.

Any thoughts?
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The hydro with stock rear brakes in my old JZX81 would lock up anytime I wanted with the most gentle pull, and I'm guessing a JZX and Soarer rear brakes are similar.

It sounds more to me like the hydro isn't working properly. Which usually is bleeding, despite people thinking they're bled properly. Not saying it is this time, but usually is.
 
Stavros said:
The hydro with stock rear brakes in my old JZX81 would lock up anytime I wanted with the most gentle pull, and I'm guessing a JZX and Soarer rear brakes are similar.

It sounds more to me like the hydro isn't working properly. Which usually is bleeding, despite people thinking they're bled properly. Not saying it is this time, but usually is.
Click to expand...

I had a buddy with me when bleeding them. I actually used a vacuum line, followed by the old fashioned way. Clockwise around the entire car, starting at the furthest away caliper from the abs unit that I plugged the input line into. Did about 4 full cycles on each caliper..... So we were very thorough. Also there is no sponginess in the wand whatsoever.

When it was jacked up and I tested it, I thought it was Gona be awesome because it felt like it was compressing the fluid straight away.

I might buy yellow shtuff pads online tonight and see if that makes a difference.

Cheers lads
 
Ps.... Anyone know if jzz30 and jza80 rear pads are the same?? I'm assuming they are..... But confirmation would be noice
 
some supras have 2 pot rears, i've supra 2pot rears on my jzx and hydro. if you were to put supra two pots on your soarer they would be a direct fit, unlike jzx where you need offset nuts. a brake bias valve might help you. or just run the rears off the hydro altogether and the fronts on the pedal.
 
You haven't crimped the pipe/ got a twist in it at some point along its length have you? Silly question, did you try bleeding the system using the hydro? If you just used your foot pedal I assume there could be some air in the hydro. Failing that, disconnect the hydro and see how easily it pulls, if its still stiff when not under load maybe its a faulty part.
 
No crimp or kink's in the pipes - they are braided and i routed them myself.
I bled the brakes first, then re-bled the two rears with just the hydro, then rebled all 4 wheels again with just the foot brakes.
No air in the hydro as if there was, the wand would feel spongey surely.
Finally - it was plenty free prior to filling with brake fluid.

I'm wondering if i may have partially seized calipers.
I'm planning on fitting yellow stuff pads at the weekend and checking the pistons at the same time.

I'm assuming that if i fit new drilled and grooved discs, i wont see any differance at all? (the current discs are in good nick).
 
Worse if anything, seen far far too many drilled discs cracking after hard use to ever use them on one of my own cars. Only ones that seem better are the genuine oem Porsche/bmw items but their cast with the holes in as opposed to being cast then having the holes drilled.

Also yellowstuff pads would be less efficient if anything, as they require heat to lock up, far more heat than a couple wand tugs is going to do.
 
DO you get much braking force on the rear wheels from your regular foot break? Your local garage may be able to check this, you might find that the cable pull is fine but there is a blockage, or as you have said a stuck calliper.... that said I would have thought only one would likely be stuck and the other would still lock???
 
Lucasdemoley said:
DO you get much braking force on the rear wheels from your regular foot break? Your local garage may be able to check this, you might find that the cable pull is fine but there is a blockage, or as you have said a stuck calliper.... that said I would have thought only one would likely be stuck and the other would still lock???
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Yeah i do mate, i checked when the car was up on stands with the wheels spinning.
Checked the calipers last night and all looks fine - no uneven pad wear either and the pads are actually not far off new.
My head is wrecked now :-( I'm going to double the length of the leaver at the weekend abd see what that does.

In summary: the wand feeds tight and not spongy, it firms up almost straight away so i doubt there is air. It does slow the car down, but doesnt lock the wheels (unless i pull really hard - not practicle when driving). But it feels like if i really applied heaps of pressure to the wand, it would eventually lock them up.


@Zonryan: I thought yellow stuff pads worked from cold also and it was just the red stuff one's that needed warming up?
 
Hmm, Yellow stuff needs warmed up dude, I ran them last season they were very meh. OEM pads for the rear 100% mate. I have Project Mu rear shoes and they are EPIC! However I also dont run a hydro.

By the sounds of things I would say that its not been bled correctly. Im not sure why you bled the brakes the way you did but if you install the hydro, you then bleed the entire system together. So brake pedal down, hydro fully pulled, caliper nipple released, then tight then release hydro, release pedal and repeat.

Despite doing this a cunt load of times in my last car, getting another 3 or 4 people to give it a go, it was still shit.

I 'assume' the soarer has a similar set up on the rear with an internal shoe? If so, My advice would be to upgrade those shoes and use the OEM handbrake. I cant think of a single time when my OEM handbrake hasnt locked when I needed it to, I can think of a hundred times the hydro didnt lock, when it was meant to.

Also, doubling the length isnt going to make it work lol! :p I would know as mine was floor mounted on a MASSIVELY long handle and it just flexed a shit ton more.
Have you tried stomping on the foot brake PRIOR to pulling the handbrake? As this was the ONLY way mine would work when I was in the middle of several NDC rounds.
 
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Internal shoes are a shit ton better imo, reliable system that will lock up over are over ane over. No hydro less shit to go wrong.

Yellowstuff technically work from Cold, but their a track pad meant to get hot to work their best.
 
ahhhhhhhhhh feck!......... I wish i could go back in time now and buy new shoes with all of the moneys i spent on the hydro lines and handbrake :-(

I can assure you lads - there's no air left in the system!!! after bleeding normally (what i read to do on a DW thread - because t'internet is always right), i then decided to do the hydro and pedal at the same time - next bleeding time round!
Also, dont forget that i was also using a pneumatic vacuum line aswell before i went to the oldfashioned method.

I did a drift day on Saturday, used the hydro on my first quali run and straightened twice..... had to revert to the OEM handbrake then for the rest of the day. What a disaster.
 
I dont think your meant to put the pedal and handle at the same time.. One first, then the other.
 
Just sell off the hydro stuff mate. Should easily fund some new shoes and fitting kits.

Could be a faulty cylinder?
 
OK - so just to give an update on this......

I fab'd up a longer handle for this (nice and heavy, made from 30mm mild bar and about 350mm high) - my god did it make some differance!!!

The extra leverage is what it needed and now the rear wheels lock every time with what seems like less than half the effort from the last track day.

Law of the leaver and all that - but ya, simple and it worked a treat.
 
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