Brakes info

[jaybee]

Does anyone know where I can go to find the piston diameters for wheel cylinders and calipers?

[Jokester]

www.napaonline.com
www.oreillyauto.com

Look up your year, make, and model, and what part.  Sometimes there a lot of data, sometimes not.

.bjb

[wayne petty]

most of the brake parts Printed catalogs have the piston sizes mixed in with that years application ....

is there a size you would like...

bendix used to have a hydraulic brake parts picture book... that listed the parts by shape and then  bore size and fittings...

so all of the identical masters and wheel cylinders but with different bore sizes are listed under one picture..  made it so easy to find something to fit...  or to change bore sizes...

just think of some late 60's fords...  there were 3 or 4 different bore sizes for the rear wheel cylinders...   so they could vary the braking power to the rear wheels without needing a proportioning valve..  heavier cars got larger diameter wheel cylinders... larger bores exerted more pressure on the brake shoes for balanced braking..

[jaybee]

most of the brake parts Printed catalogs have the piston sizes mixed in with that years application ....

is there a size you would like...

bendix used to have a hydraulic brake parts picture book... that listed the parts by shape and then  bore size and fittings...

so all of the identical masters and wheel cylinders but with different bore sizes are listed under one picture..  made it so easy to find something to fit...  or to change bore sizes...

just think of some late 60's fords...  there were 3 or 4 different bore sizes for the rear wheel cylinders...   so they could vary the braking power to the rear wheels without needing a proportioning valve..  heavier cars got larger diameter wheel cylinders... larger bores exerted more pressure on the brake shoes for balanced braking..

Yes, actually the specific calipers I'm looking for are the fronts from late model Tahoe/Silverado models and the rear calipers from Explorer rear ends.  I found a really nice brake force calculator here http://www.jakelatham.com/radical/info/brake_calculators.shtml#pistondiameters .  It could save a bunch of guesswork and parts swapping when putting together a system from different sources.