Soma07

If so did you have any problems with the hard brake lines?

I have a set in my garage I'll be installing soon. Everything looks very straightfoward except for the brake lines. The LT1 style rear brakes mount the caliper behind the axle but the LS1 style goes on the other side. I haven't looked closely enough to determine if there will be a problem yet, but i figured if someone else had done this before they could just tell me

Thanks!

atljar

Just did it on friday.

The lines you do have to bend a little. Passenger side took more than drivers. I just grabbed them with pliars and reformed them.

Also if you are planning on having E brakes, you need to replace the e brake cables (front and rear 2) with ls1 style, and get the e brake cable brackets that mount on your LCA bolt. Thats something i didnt know until i actually tried to do it.

Soma07

Aww crap, the front e-brake cable is different too? I ordered the two rear ones but I figured the front one would be the same... I also ordered the e-brake cable brackets, a whopping $4 ea (for once something thats cheaper than I expected).

Anyhow thanks for the info!

Xride

sorry I cant add to this thread but.... Front E brake cable? can someone explian this to me?

atljar

Front e brake cable = one from e brake handle to the spliter to the 2 rear cables. Not for the front brakes silly

I thought the ls1 style was a little shorter, but honestly i didnt compare. I just ordered the front cable along with the rears at the same time and went from there. Give the lt1 style a shot, it may just work. If not, next day parts

93formula

do the LS1 rears make a difference in performance or is it just for looks?

predator

well considering the rear brakes dont do much for braking anyways probably just looks

Soma07

Compared to LT1 rear brakes the rotors have a slightly larger diameter, more mass, and thicker vanes so they will cool better. The caliper is also a bit more beefy so it should resist spreading better (not that its a problem with rear brakes anyways).

Best of all they use a small drum brake for the e-brake vs. the ridiculous setup on the LT1 cars.

So all things considered they are better, but I'm not expecting much in the way of performance gains. I'm doing it mainly to get rid of the stupid LT1 e-brake.

shoebox

If you are only swapping brakes, you will need to swap to LS1 axles, too (which sounds like Soma07 is). Obviously, you need them for the parking brake and they are also a slightly different length than the LT1 axles. You must match axles with brakes to avoid clearance problems between the rotor and caliper.

[edit] my error-I made it seem the parking brake was part of the axle when it is not. The axles are slightly different lengths, though.

Black_Z28

Why are you converting to LS1 rear brakes? There's not much of a difference between the two.

93formula

so it would be easier to pick up a LS1 rear with the brakes and axles intact?

Soma07

Are you sure about that Rob? I had never heard that before (then again no one runs LS1 rear brakes on an LT1 either).

I see that the part numbers are different though... Humm...

And FYI the parking brake doesn't seem to have anything to do with the axle itself. The "drum" part is integrated into the rotor, and the shoe mounts directly to the backing plate for the calipers.


atljar: Did you have swap in LS1 axles as well?

shoebox

Oops, yeah, the parking brake is in the rotor. I got that mixed up.

I do know that the axles are different lengths and it has to do with accomodating the brake. There have been people that have posted problems on this board after swapping to the LS1 brakes and not changing axles. I think the rotor will rub on the caliper.

You may/may not be able to correct it with some creatively placed spacers. Just remember that you are dealing with a very important system on your car.

Soma07

Thanks, I guess I won't know for sure till I try it! Heck if third-gen guys can convert from drum brakes to LS1 brakes then it should be a piece of cake for me

http://www.thirdgen.org/newdesign/te...reardisc.shtml

atljar

Just came across this thread again and also I got a PM from soma07. I thought i would just copy the entire PM for everyones future reference

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Re: LS1 rear brakes

quote:
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Soma07 wrote on 11-09-2003 11:55 PM:
Thanks again for your info on converting to LS1 rear brakes.

I have one more question for you though. Rob (shoebox) says when you swap to LS1 rear brakes you have to run LS1 axles as well. Is that true? He says because the axles are slightly different lengths the caliper won't line up correctly or something.

FWIW I checked and the part numbers for the axles are different LT1 vs. LS1.

Thanks!

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While i have never heard that, it would explain this... I have a 12 bolt that was originally in an ls1 car. With the LT1 brakes on it, i run a spacer behind the rotor to get the rotor centered between the pads. Didnt really know why, but just attributed to the rear end being slightly different style. Once i switched to the ls1s the rotors were perfect without the spacer. If the caliper doesnt line up with the rotors perfectly, just run a little washer on the caliper mounting bolts and that should shim it correctly.

~Jared

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