Disc brake upgrades. The C3 that I just bought has an LS conversion with a belt 4L 80 trans. It has 17 inch American racing five spoke wheels. Can I go to a C6 Rotor caliber set up Because the force system set up just doesn’t work gotta really lean on that brake pedal to bring the car to a halt thank you for your advice first time on doing this I think :-)

 

There is a lot of options but if your stock brakes working as new would be more than enough

 

I think bigger diameter rims for bigger better
brakes.
I think there is a C6 to C3 kit?

 

Before replacing anything, I would try to determine what the issue is with your pedal feel.

I crew for a Corvette vintage racer, and we race with stock Corvette calipers (our rules require it so we don't have a choice). On the 65 we race we have custom machined spacers in the fronts so we can run thicker pads, and we've moved the calipers behind the rotors to make it easier to run cooling hoses to the center of the rotors. We race a 71 that only has racing pads added to stock J56 calipers. With either set up we can run multiple laps without any fade or braking issues. If stock calipers can hold up under a race car, I don't see why they shouldn't be sufficient on just about any street car.

Wilwood makes replacement Corvette D8 aluminum calipers in both 4 and 6 piston designs, but since they use standard D8 size pads, they don't increase the pad or rotor contact area, so they don't really improve stopping power any. The only advantage to the D8 Wilwoods is because they're aluminum they offer better heat dissipation and a couple pound reduction in unsprung weight. On the street I don't think you'd notice any difference between stock calipers, and the Wilwood D8's. Wilwood also offers a Corvette "Big Brake" front caliper kit using their Superlite calipers and 14" rotors, but I think it requires 18" wheels.

https://www.wilwood.com/

Baer Brakes also has big brake kits for both front and rear of 63-82 Corvettes. They make both 13" and 14" rotor kits. I don't know the wheel requirements for them, but the 13's may work in 17" wheels. I'm sure Baer could tell you.

https://baer.com/

 

I was where you are a few years ago. The manual brakes on the C3 just don't grab like we are used to. After rebuilding,,, replacing,,, overhauling,,,,, everything,,, the brakes are just ok. One thing that could be wrong is the MC that's on the car. For a manual brake car, it's very important that the MC bore is 1 inch, for the power brake car it's 1 1/8 inch. It doesn't sound like much but can make a huge difference.

 

If you have to lean on the pedal, may I ask if they are ceramics?

There are lots of vendors that sell pads. I think you may begood if you just ask for a pad with more bite. Different pad material can make a huge difference.

 

Since it’s an engine swap, I’m gonna guess that it might have been converted to manual brakes. Are the power brakes still there?

 

A brake pad upgrade would be huge difference in performance. I had mediocre to poor brake performance with manual brakes and upgraded to power brakes instead of a pad change and they worked great.....but. I had raced on a road course for a day, in which the brakes got extremely hot. I had organic pads on at that time and the next day after those pads had cooled it was like stepping on a brick. Your pads could be the issue. The ceramics are great but depending on the blend they could be very dusty

 

Exactly! I was running my car at Bridgehampton some years ago. After a session, I came in and couldn't stop the car. Luckily, my spot had a chain link fence with stopped me. It taught me a lesson about pad material.
Now I run a street / strip pad recommended and never had an issue again.

Now I would write Hawk or Carboteck, tell them about how you use the car and what you are trying to improve. Let them recommend a new pad. A friend who races, told me to consider Carboteck. He said Hawk has discontinued some of their pad materials. But for a steet application like yours, both should have a pad.

 

If you are going to use it for just street, use normal organic or semi metallic. I have tried HPS, ceramic, semi metallic and organic. All of the "performance" pads that I have tried, don't work worth a darn when cold, they need to get hot before they work well.

 

Here's my LS3 with T56 6-speed, still running factory brake size's

Using Willwood Calipers since the seals take the heat of track days. Biggest problem I have is brake pad knock back at the track.

With proper setup rotor run-out / rotors / the the most important is the brake pads. I am running Raybestos ST47 front / ST43 back.

Down side to performance pads is dust.

 

Your Raybestos ST47 pads,,,,, don't they work the best when they are heated up, and not so much when they are cold? I have tested my disc's and after a drive around town I can still touch them.

 

Yea I used to think that many years ago.

I would switch from street to track pads and track to street pads. Street pads heated were worse than the track pads cold (st47 / ST43). I don't switch them anymore. The ST47 is great even when cold.

Only issue is dust.

 

The question is, if you had a car your wife drives only around town, would you put the ST47 pads on it, or normal organic/semi metallic pads?

 

Yes, I would leave the brakes as is. They are much better overall cold vs any of the street pads. Especially with light braking for street driving. With 18" high performance tires it takes a lot of brake pressure to lock the tires.

With simple 15" tires street tires it takes very little brake pressure to get the car stopped in any conditions.

Never go back to simple basic street pads.

But then again I also drive a C6 Grandsport version which is better than the C3 with OEM street PADS, but again the C6 tires is what helps. Makes braking noticable.