Re: Status report - rear Porsche brakes ... (archive)

When I see the pics, it makes me wonder if grinding away that much of the material might jeopordize the structural integrity of the joints. BMW often does not build a lot of margin into their designs.

In this case, the control arms are incredibly beefy and I only removed a couple mm of material. I'm not too worried about a structural failure. When I do the other side, I'll take lots of photos of the grinding process and will show before/after pics with close-ups.

The wheel bearings are one example.

The wheel bearings are an example of a poor design, not an example of cutting engineering margins too far. I wouldn't be surprised to see an upgraded wheel bearing assembly appear on the parts CDs soon, perhaps even in the 2002 models due to all the warranty claims for shimmy problems.

I look forward to hearing how the brakes perform. You can probably get some real good measurements since your neighbor has the same car with stock brakes. Swapping wheels for the tests would be great.

My neighbor has the Porsche fronts and the stock rears. I'll certainly do some back to back comparisons of the two setups and post the results.

Dave Z.

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