Hey people, I'm looking at upgrading my brakes as the drums on my 68 fasty are nearly dead. Looking for advice on kits and set ups along with recommended suppliers of new parts. Was thinking of a dual circuit disk brake kit with 5 stud stock spacing and offset, possible with a booster as well.Any opinions? Worth considering a drop spindle set? Best place to buy?

Any advice would be appreciated.

I was after front disks for my 66 fasty with wide 5 stud pattern. Looked hard and found the German CSP kit. It's pretty exxy and I think it widens the front end a little bit. Maybe 10mm or 15 per side. Also the alloy centre didn't appeal to me. It's just a personal opinion. I didn't want any alloy on my front wheel hub or suspension.
Anyhow I rang John Sherman to see if his Beetle kits work. No was the answer but I did, after much talking, convince him to have look-see at my front spindles. I figured that he had the disk forgings from the beetle wide five disk kits and perhaps he could make it work.
So in a few days ill be checking out what he came up with. Price was right (less than 800) and it ticked all the boxes for me except I'm not sure if it widens the front track. I was told theres no more room to narrow it so whatever it is - it is cause otherwise the calipers will rub on the wheel stud flange. I'll check against my stock setup when I get the chance. John couldn't tell me cause I only gave him the spindles. As far as road test I can't do that for quite some time. I'm mid build right now. It's gonna be months.

if yu guys lnow John Shermann he does all that on the GC
put in yer location fellas for good results

Thanks for the replies guys.I'll be keen to hear how the beetle kit works exraycer and I'll give John Sherman a buzz to see what other options he might have. I'm down in Canberra but im sure he can ship down this way..

It's not really a beetle kit. It is specific to type 3. I think he only used the disk forging blank from ghe beetle kit and machined it specifically for the type 3 and he also made a specific bracket for the caliper to bolt up to the spindle. The caliper is not VW but it is a caliper commonly used in OZ.

I'm in Sydney. Shipping is extra but no problem.

He has rear disks that should fit but I'm not doing rear disks on mine. I can't seem to justify it plus I'm not sure if I'd want a rear disk brake setup without a booster. Just happy to have a simple front disk kit that I can use with wide 5 studs.

I think I have a disk brake conversion kit for type 3. It was bought mistakenly from the UK, when I was buying one for my 68 bus. Cost me close on $1000. Quite happy to sell it for a fair bit less to just get rid of it.

I will find out exactly what it is that I hav3 if you are interested, might be what you're after.

Hey thanks for the offer but I have already paid John Sherman for his first Type 3 Wide five kit and I'm quite keen to see what he came up with. Should get it in about a week. He's just getting the kit zinc coated now. He made one other set for another customer in QLD but I'm pretty sure he's keen to make a few more to get his development time back.

Get the brakes from Glenn, aka VWCOOL. He does a type 3 kits which are CNC billet hub and bracket, Holden finned VS calipers (aka VN V8 calipers) ford AU series 1 vended disks. He modifies your spindles and provided a MC to suit the conversion.


also what ever bolt pattern you want.

Thanks Vlad but I am committed to johns kit for the moment. I will get it running first and test it out. Also I thought those kits you mention wouldn't support wide 5 stud pattern. I could have remembered it wrong but I didn't want adapters cause they add to front track width.

68 model yeah? thought those have disk front end as standard.

Nah 66 model. Wide five drums all round. I'm going for original look wide five pattern type 3 smoothie rims so the wide five lug pattern was required.
Anyhow, the kit arrived. I was gonna take a few pics for John Sherman over the weekend. It looks good. The caliper is very close to the outer lug bolt flange. I don't think he could have made it any narrower. I will compare with stock measurements when I get a chance. The setup isn't exactly light weight because it's all steel. If you need to save weight then the more expensive CSP German kit with the alloy hub is for you but honestly I just wanted it solid and reliable. It's not gonna be a race car. Just a solid streeter.

Just curious, are they engineered ?,I have been down this path with kits from the gold coast that are not engineered, if they have not been engineered by Sherman you will have to carry this out with the possibility that they will fail, this is a common problem with brakes and other modification that are sold in Australia.

I am currently disigning and building a component for use legally on the road to suit type one, i will not say what it is but it requires destructive testing of any components that i build to comply, if the hub is not a propriority part it requires to be engineered along with the caliper mounting bracket, also has any calculation been done to see if the displacement of the caliper will work with the standard dual curcuit master cylinder without altering the brake bias, i had a set of brakes from the gold coast that used the capella calipers also, could never get a acceptable pedal, After that experence i have built three sets of brakes including the billet hubs and brackets and all required the manditory cad drawings that had to send to the engineer for his approval before they were machined, followed by the inspection and brake test, it becomes your responsability to carry out the engineering at your expense eventhough you did not make it, In my opinion all modified parts that are sold for road use should have already been engineered and accompanied with the paper work, i intend to sell my parts all over Australia and they will be acompanied by all the engineering certs and test resalts that will make it simple to get approved

Yup agreed. I tip my hat to you for doing the due diligence before you sell a product for road use. They all should be approved from the seller for every state regulatory Authority but none do anything like that for my application. Thats the reality for someone wanting a wide 5 disk brake front end on a type 3 that does not alter the track width or use foreign calipers.
If you decide to make a kit thats perfect for early type 3's to use wide 5 please let me know especially if you've gone to the trouble of supplying it with destructive test data and all the relevant docs for a breezy engineers approval. Unfortunately as much as I want it I'd have to say it would be a poor economic decision on your part considering the total sales would be pretty low for type 3's. Type 1,s would be a much better proposition. For the Type 3 dilemma most people will just bolt on a set of disks from the later four bolt type 3 front end and drive away once they discover how crappy this situation is. If I can't get the balance right and feel that the kit doesn't meet my expectations then I'll be doing exactly that.

talk to VVDS in Sydney for your wide 5 brake set up 9789-1777

I'm sure they appreciate the plug but I did my homework. I know Boris and Michael because VVDS is local to me so I discussed it at length. They do not have a kit for type 3 nor are they keen to try to make one. I don't blame them. Total sales would probably amount to 2 units per year.

It should be manditory to carry out the engineering before you sell a item to people that is going to be used on public roads, you seam to be defending the seller who has done this continuously, a lot of people do not know about the legal requirement for the item to be engineered and approved.

Not taking that bait. Have a good day mate.

John's been around for 40yrs+
he must be doing something right

eXraycer...
have you got pics of this setup.. I two am looking for Wide 5 brake kit. any info pics, size difference etc etc would be awesome.
cheers matty

Matty I'm digging out all my parts on the weekend so will get a chance before then. My engineer is going over my IRS conversion, kafer bars, and brake components on Tuesday. Booked him in last week for a preliminary inspection of the work I've done so I can avert any potential issues before I get too far down the road with finishes and assembly. (A long road I expect)
Also wanting to discuss with him the options for lowering.

all sounds good. lowering is the easy part if you have the correct rims/tyres ;o)

really interested in the disc wide 5 setup for the type 3... all the best.
matty

A couple of pics for you Matty.
Just mocked it up. +11mm each side. I expected about 8mm.
Engineer said up to 12mm offset change each side is ok.

very nice... guessing they are now in?

Will be a bit longer before I'm reassembling things. Just got em out and mocked up for the engineer to give me an idea if they might pass. I had a progress inspection on the rear IRS conversion and other things so I could move ahead and paint my rear subframe. He liked the rear subframe I made. Gave me OK to paint it which means I didn't need a crack test. It helped that I used a professional frame builder to weld it up with a tig and the welds were all really neat.

The brakes need to be fitted, tested on the track and track width checked with a tape measure. I also need to give him the diameter of the caliper piston and brake pad thickness so he can work out if the reservoir will be adequate. He mentioned I might need a proportioning valve to get the balance right once the car is able to be tested. It's gonna be a while and I don't even know if I'll even stay keen on the wide 5 rims before I get it on the road but I had to give it a go.

Hey man,
I have the same brakes from john on my baja for about 3 years now. I'm very happy with them

except they are based on a different rotor to match the kombi axle.

Quote:

Originally posted by nils Hey man, I have the same brakes from john on my baja for about 3 years now. I'm very happy with them except they are based on a different rotor to match the kombi axle.

Until very recently i have been running the 22mm single circuit kombi master cylinder. l do have an adjustable proportioning valve because they do hook up better than the T3 drums on the back, though i do have 10r's back there.

I dare say if the wheels where the same size they would be pretty close to spot on

You guys know that you can buy a wide five disc brake kit for the ball joing bug that will fit a Type 3?... I made up a set using the AC Industries kit a while back.
If you fit stock late disc brake spindles to your Type 3, it all bolts on.... If want to stay with the standard drum spindles, fabricating a plate adapter for the caliper is a snack.... I've made a few sets in the past, for a variety of calipers and rotors.... I usually build a mock-up using a bit of MDF, then draw it up in a vector based application (I use Adobe Illustrator), export the file as a DXF and have the plates laser cut.