being looking at getting some boxster brake calipers for my s3 what else do i need to make these fit plus cost?and what size disc would i need?
Porsche boxster brake upgrade
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no there fronts dont fancy down grading the brakes with rears lol!tuffty your in the know what bits i do i need where do i get them from?
i dont want to sound negative but the worst brakes ive ever had was an 2.7 boxter my wife had 8 years ago awefull, and to be honest ive never owned one but ive driven a 911 "996", awefull brakes, ok it was 11 years old i had to be honest with my mate who let me drive the 911, i liked it not for an everyday drive but the brakes were really bad. hes answer was yes they are "you have to really stand on them".
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As long as they're front calipers you'll be fine. Actually measure the pistons though, dont take peoples word for it, because people lie.
NO car has the same calipers front and rear.
NO car has the same calipers front and rear.
cecilthesausage
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I have the AMD Porsche Big Reds on mine and to be perfectly honest with you mate they are no better than the standard stock S3 brakes even though there 4 pots.... But oh do they look nice behind a set of black rims...I know someone who is selling the brembo LCR set up... PM me and I will give you his number if your interested
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Jesus, another thread full of crap.....
Porsche are renowned for having some of the best oem brakes in the world.
AMD 'big reds' sound like someone has taken the biggest Porsche calipers they can find and made them fit without thought to actual performance. Bigger isn't always better!
I run 330mm 996 fronts on my a3, and there ****** brilliant. They're a thousand times better the standard s3 312mm crap, and having tried a few sets, I find them better than the LCR 323mm brembo setup.
Being a monoblock caliper they're lighter than lcr brembos, and give a stiffer pedal feel.
To mount 996 calipers you'll need to have custom carriers and hoses made up, and choose your disc size to suit as well
Porsche are renowned for having some of the best oem brakes in the world.
AMD 'big reds' sound like someone has taken the biggest Porsche calipers they can find and made them fit without thought to actual performance. Bigger isn't always better!
I run 330mm 996 fronts on my a3, and there ****** brilliant. They're a thousand times better the standard s3 312mm crap, and having tried a few sets, I find them better than the LCR 323mm brembo setup.
Being a monoblock caliper they're lighter than lcr brembos, and give a stiffer pedal feel.
To mount 996 calipers you'll need to have custom carriers and hoses made up, and choose your disc size to suit as well
how many porshes have you owned prawn, size does matter your wife just doesnt want to upset you. s3 312mm arnt crap and with the correct pads and fluid are quite good
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I havnt owned any porsches 
What I'm saying is, size isn't everything in brakes, it has to be matched.
Enormous 4 pot calipers with piston sizes far too huge will have huge mechanical power, but be horrid to use due to the volume of fluid that needs to be displaced to make them work.
A 4 pot caliper needs to be well matched to the master cylinder with which it works.
Personally, I think 312's are gash for hard use. I drive a car that's 200kg lighter than your s3's, and even with seriously good discs and pads and fluid, the 312's fall apart long before a 15 minute track session comes to an end.....
They might be fine for road use, but when you're pushing on, they just don't cut it
What I'm saying is, size isn't everything in brakes, it has to be matched.
Enormous 4 pot calipers with piston sizes far too huge will have huge mechanical power, but be horrid to use due to the volume of fluid that needs to be displaced to make them work.
A 4 pot caliper needs to be well matched to the master cylinder with which it works.
Personally, I think 312's are gash for hard use. I drive a car that's 200kg lighter than your s3's, and even with seriously good discs and pads and fluid, the 312's fall apart long before a 15 minute track session comes to an end.....
They might be fine for road use, but when you're pushing on, they just don't cut it
cecilthesausage
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jdas03
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I used the standard S3 brakes with EBC turbo grooved discs, yellow stuff pads and new fluid on a track day.
They were ok ish, but they didnt bite very well so sometimes felt like you werent going to stop in time :-S
This maybe down to the yellow stuff pads though, i heard they were crap compared to DS2500s.
I think for fast road use good discs like turbo grooved coupled with DS2500s which i heard were amazing would probably do and save you a packet!
I mean how much braking do you need on the roads? If your tracking the car maybe its a different story?
They were ok ish, but they didnt bite very well so sometimes felt like you werent going to stop in time :-S
This maybe down to the yellow stuff pads though, i heard they were crap compared to DS2500s.
I think for fast road use good discs like turbo grooved coupled with DS2500s which i heard were amazing would probably do and save you a packet!
I mean how much braking do you need on the roads? If your tracking the car maybe its a different story?
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"Big Reds" are not 996 fronts. 996 fronts are 996 fronts, and can be found on the 996 carrera 2/4 and boxster s, in red, black, or silver.
The brakes commonly known as "big reds" are an older 2 part heavy caliper, which I think are from the 993 turbo (not sure on that)
To be honest, the term 'big red' to me sounds like something somebody would say who didn't actually know what brakes he had, other than they were big, and red.
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cecilthesausage
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I stand corrected Prawn my Big Reds are the 993,s because they have 4 allen bolts on them, the 996 are monoblock so my friend Jamie tells me from Nelson Porsche... And although I appreciate your input and I know you know what your talking about there is no need to be so aggressive in your posting..... because you like me at 1 stage must have known absolutely f@@k all and took on all peoples input....At the end of the day we are all here to learn about something we have a common interest in... Cheers Rob
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The part numbers given above are Boxster fronts, and have 40/36mm pistons, so should work just fine.
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Good point, well made. My Apologies
As for calipers, I believe the boxster
Fronts are the same fitment as the evil boxster rears (hence people thinking they're the same caliper) so can be mounted using the typical boxster rear carriers, and even used on 312mm discs.
The 996/boxster S front carriers can be found on eBay sometimes, by a place called vagbremtechclinic I think.
A guy on ukmkivs called DaveB used to sell all the mounting kits for various caliper options, but he recently stopped doing them sadly as he's too busy in his day job!
i really need some rear brakes that wont protrude out so much on my s3 as I have a slight issue with them touching the back of the spokes and it causes me to run 5mm spacers which i would prefer to remove to maximise arch clearance, i'm not overly fussed about increasing the peformance. I'm no expert with braking systems and have never changed anything to do with them before and would appreciate any positive input that may help..
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Not sure I follow what you are saying... rear brakes? I assume you have changed them for something else? The only brakes that you need on the back are the std S3 ones... the S3 braking bias is very much to the front with the rears doing very little... the std rear brake caliper and disc setup on the back is perfectly adequate for almost all situations tbh...
You don't even need to run anything other than a good quality std pad either
<tuffty/>
hi, no it is the standard set-up, i'm not sure of the name of the part which sticks out furthest towards the back of the wheel and can clash with the rear of the spokes, would it be the caliper carrier or the caliper itself ? basically i need a little bit more brake/wheel clearance on the back (only a few mm) and am not too sure if shaving them down a bit on their proudest points is a good idea !! What would be nice is a straight bolt on replacement with near or equivalent performance.. would the rear brakes be the same on a 1.8t q a3 for example or would they be a bit smaller and give a bit of extra room ? forgive any naievity on my part please and apologies for possibly going a bit off topic !! ..
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I understand what you're saying, some flat faced dished wheels will catch on standard 256 rears. Annoyingly, I think you'll have just the same problem with standard a3 232x9 solids!
What spec are the wheels? (offset and width)
Unless they're HUGE wheels I can't see a 5mm spacer really giving any clearance issues with tyres on the arch
What spec are the wheels? (offset and width)
Unless they're HUGE wheels I can't see a 5mm spacer really giving any clearance issues with tyres on the arch
Hi, wheels are 10.5" on the back with offset of approx 25 .. I just noticed the other day that with 4 people in the car (happens once in a blue moon) it catches very slightly where the arch meets the rear bumper, as its a panel join i'm fairly sure that particular area cant be rolled or flared and i cant put any narrower tyres on so my only option is to remove the 5mm spacers which leaves me with this brake clearance issue
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Ah, they are HUGE wheels then!
Not a lot you can do mate.
I'd look into having the arches pulled a tad, I'm sure it can be done
Not a lot you can do mate.
I'd look into having the arches pulled a tad, I'm sure it can be done
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Only one answer for your problem mate, don't carry passengers!
Any pics of your car? Specifically the rear wheels with the calipers on show. I'm interested to see how close these wheels are to your rear calipers, as I was a bit baffled that you could have a wheel that can clear the front brakes but not the rears, but a 10.5" dished rim would make sense!
i have a wheel arch roller which i have already used !! As i said previously, its the part of the arch which joins wih the bumper that catches and it is not rollable unforunately.. with the spacers fitted there is approx 3-4mm clearance from the caliper i reckon. Strangely the fronts are also wide at 9.5" and dont have any issues at all
