I'm working on a conversion kit for a bike for better brakes - which won't be hard, about anything is better than single piston calipers.

My problem is sensory overload. I read where 6 is bad/good, 4 is better/same.

I'm looking for some factual information here. Not so much what someone heard, but rather what is known. Not what is latest and greatest, but what can work and how. I'm also looking for information on specific brand stuff, like what worked how and when.

I know we could spend a grand and maybe have some good trick 6 piston Nissin racing calipers or some near top shelf Brembos, but this is for the average rider and needs be done on a reasonable cost calipers - read as used ebay sportbike salvage calipers. I'm also staying away from radial mount at the moment, but they all seem good. We're talking what some have called circumferencial mount or side mount.

Here it is. I like the look and know the ubiquitous Tokico six piston calipers have some cool appeal, but I've read about them sticking and warping pads. How much of this can fall to pressure washing on the sticking and hard track use on the warpage? Can the average guy deal with six piston for some aggressive road riding, but nothing remotely close to track days? In other words cornering isn't going to be threshold braking for every turn and highly unlikely to be that way in any conditions - they know they have to go to work Monday. Tell me about how the 6 piston have held up under what sort of use on what sort of bike. Specifics mean something here.

On the four piston calipers clearly some of the mid-late 90s calipers used on some GSXRs, CBRs, YZFs, and ZXs have been excellent and on par with six piston. The differencial piston calipers appear to have some advantage too, but still others are good. Which had best abilities? Seems like the Yamaha brakes made by whomever are always top notch. Nissins always seemed good, but which style and off what bikes. Tokico seems to be kind of second fiddle or even third, but is it reality on the street for an aggressive rider?

In other words, how do the brakes that you have used work for you. Did you find any one make from a given year of motorcycle better or worse in the high performace 4 piston group? I wonder about the sort of generic looking 4 piston Tokicos used by Kawasaki for a number of models over a number of years. The calipers look kind of bland, but if they work well they could be the ticket. How about the differencial piston calipers, the ones with the larger trailing piston (in direction of rotor rotation)? How are they?

Help a guy out here, give me some real world stuff. If you changed calipers why?

 

What bike are you going to use the brakes on? And it will be just for aggressive street riding/commuter?

The biggest concern is to what will fit your ride without modifying spacers, disks, and even wheels.

Single piston setups will work well depending on the application (size of bike, etc), fluid and the pad selection. I have also machined new pistons and bored calipers to fit my needs. (not recommended for most or DOT approved).

But generally, I have had really good luck with most of the 4 piston setups from the 80's until now. Excluding the tokico's that were used on the first and second generation 10r's. (04-07) and that was just a weight savings and using pistons that transferred the heat into the fluid too fast and also with no heat shield. I have not been able to play with any 6 piston calipers. Some serious weight to them in comparison to a 4 piston setup that can be had for maybe $25.

 

The whole idea is to get a stronger brake with more feel from the OEM single piston caliper. As was stated, the plan is to see if we can develop a mount kit for several Kawasaki's and maybe others. I plan to do a different set up for my own Zephyr 550 just because I want to do so, in spite of the fact that the twin piston ones work mostly adequately. It would be kind of cool to have overkill one finger brakes. But our plan is for the average performance rider, not the roadracer. The rider who may do some brisk back road riding or some hard runs needing some strong braking at the end of a stretch (aka drag strip maybe). Brake fade is probably not much concern, but brake power at the lever is.

I appreciate your comments, if there was one specific caliper you remember please let me know. I can do some digging to see what all models had it and then that helps define either the general brackets or a combination of bracket and refurbished caliper kit. Most of my experience really is with the old Nissin twin pistons of the 80s and some of the 90s. I'd just like to hear from some middle average performance riders, not so much the track day riders/roadracers and cruisers - but I certainly wouldn't ignore their comments. After all, experience is experience and I can sort through the facts. Guys that want to go out on a twisty back road and work it a bit, but could use some better brakes - which includes myself.


As was said, I'm looking for some facts about the six piston Tokicos which were on numerous ZXs and GSXRs and are readily available for ball park $50 on ebay for a pair. I know some ZRX riders are dumping them and going to four piston calipers, yet there are others who are picking them up and putting them on in place of four piston calipers.

Then there are the four piston calipers, which are the best, better, and good. I already have a set of 1990 CBR calipers with the remote reservoir hopefully on the way having won the bid on ebay. But I'd like to hear more about some of them like the previously referred to rather non-descript looking Tokico four pistons from the 96-00 ZXs. Not too trick looking, but if they work great, who cares.

I'd also like to hear from some people who have some reference for differences between remote reservoir master cylinders versus the radial (?) master cylinders of the newer bikes. Does it really add feel or is it marginal at best. I know the remote reservoir versus the standard set up is a wash, both use the same mechanism, one just has a sort of "trickness" to it. Like I said, I have the MC coming and will probably use it because it mates with the four piston calipers, but I'm still kind of enamored with those six piston Tokicos... I'm not afraid to play, it's just putting out the money.

I'd much rather know more about the calipers so I know which ones I want to use for our conversion. Although I'll probably do one six piston set up just because and then a four piston, I still want to know which four piston caliper is preferable over others. I personally am leaning toward Nissins or the Yamaha Sumitomos.

At the moment I am disregarding radial mount calipers, mostly becaused all of them seem to be considered good stuff.

 

another read. http://motorcyclebloggers.com/tech-t...ter-cylinders/

 

I appreciate your link, but I have to say it was nothing new. I understand leverages both mechanical and hydraulic. What I am trying to learn has nothing to do with the hydraulics it has to do with comparison of product. It has to do with making a choice what calipers to use for our project. Once the knowledge is gained a choice will be made.

I am trying to find out what real experience riders have that have ridden a variety of motorcycles with different brake caliper sets. I am trying to learn about braking capability and maintenance issues. I don't have time or money to gain that experience myself over quite lliterally several sets of calipers. From there, the master cylinder choice will be dealt with if needed.

We already know the single piston calipers do not have the braking power of twin piston, four piston, and six piston calipers. Part of it is the diameter of the swept area for braking. The pad areas are possibly similar in size, but the longer twin/four/six piston pads are radially narrower, but longer at that outer radius increasing the leverage factor of the braking to the wheel. The same effect as putting on larger rotors to get the braking area at a larger diameter to increase leverage.

We also already know there are supposed issues with the six piston calipers, but are trying to learn more specifics. Then there is the strength of the four piston calipers. If a rider has ridden several sportbikes over the past fifteen years they may have some seriously valuable information for us. Part of the goal of our project is to make a caliper conversion that is affordable as well as an improvement. Otherwise we'd just go get some Brembos.

But I appreciate your thought process and hope you can give me some more insight on some specific calipers from your experience if your rides had the four or six piston calipers.

 

Be aware also of the relationship between the calipers and the master cylinder. Too large a piston in the master cylinder will give you very firm brakes (very little lever travel) but requiring a lot of lever pressure, while too small a piston diameter will give you a lot of lever travel but relatively little lever pressure needed for hard braking. I tend to like it that way, because it actually gives more controllable braking, but I'm in a minority. Either way it's personal taste.

Rob

 

While re-reading things, I appreciate your actual personal experience, I need to know are you talking about the kind of non-descript Tokicos that had really light lettering on them as working well, and weren't the first and second gen 10Rs using radial caipers? Those are of out of the picture at the moment. We're looking at adapting four and six piston calipers to Eliminators as well as the Zephyrs and maybe even the Concours since the Zeph and Connie use the same mount plate. More checking to be done... The basic fork layout is in AutoCAD and I'm waiting to get some brake calipers to measure and see what need be done to make the brackets.

Which specific non-radial 4 piston calipers treated you well? Were they all Kawasaki (usually Tokico, but maybe a few Nissins, I'm not too sure and thus the questions) or did you get a chance to run Hondas or Suzukis? I've seen some side (or circumfrencial) mount calipers from 95 and earlier ZX6s and 7s that aren't the most exciting looking calipers (as we know though, looks ain't everything). I guess I'm trying to see if the easily accessable Tokicos are good or not. Seem to show up on ebay all the time from $25 and up. Those non-descript looking calipers just don't look as good as the six piston Tokicos and four piston Nissins with the bold silver (sanded) lettering on black or grey calipers. If those work they will likely be our choice though, since they are readily available and even Kawasaki parts... Keep the Kaw rider happy.

By the way, the biggest thing going for six piston is the techie bling appeal. I've done enough research to know the four piston set ups are going to be as good for our use. About the only plus to the six is the sheer stopping capability that might benefit a few drag racers. They seem to hold heat too much when repeatedly used heavily like they would in roadracing and track days. For general use they seem a bit maintenance intensive... but there's still that "bling" appeal of seeing them on a bike. Can you say "ego driven"? And yes I have that sort of feeling, so I have to try a set myself. I'm still going to use either CBR or YZF calipers personally unless I hear a lot of negative somewhere. Not seen it so far.

 

I had a rather snooty comment I made and deleted after I realized this wasn't the thread where I just kept getting the same rehash of what people have read versus actual experience. For that comment I apologize if it got emailed to anyone. I'm trying to learn about calipers specifically. Even the greatest master cylinder isn't going to make a single piston caliper compare to a four piston. It still comes down to pad area swept and the diameter of that pad area. Twin piston single side calipers and four/six piston opposed calipers get maximum pad area out at the largest possible diameter, thus our decision to see if we can adapt four and six piston calipers, due to fixed mounting versus floating mounting of the twin piston single side calipers. I'm trying to learn if some display any flex or characteristics that make them less desirable.

As I said, I already know all the details of hydraulic leverage based on piston sizes and pressure. No need for more of the same.

Now if you're riding a sportbike with four or six piston calipers and maybe even have some serious time on a few different ones, tell me about how the brakes themselves worked for you in more extended riding time. That's what I need. Even a master cylinder change may not alter caliper feel if it's flex or maybe some grabby nature. Tell me about them. If you did do a master cylinder change tell me about how the caliper worked after that. Give some detail on the caliper brand and bike. Give detail on master cylinder change if done.

 

hmm,ok, since you have your personal desired brackets design, I will not talk about radial calipers.

You are also looking for cruiser stopping power and it appears that you may be over engineering for the application.

Your "non-descript Tokicos" is kind of throwing me off possibly. You know as well as I, that the bling factor is easily obtainable. Calipers are just cast aluminum. Polishing, anodizing, repainting, etc is easily done.


Stay with a four piston caliper set up, fit it to your bracket design to fit the rotor diameter, fit good lines, your pad choice to meet your M/C and rotor material feel that meet your expectations at the cheapest price. Everyone is different on what the braking package should be. But you already know the KISS rule.

Ok, so keeping with the "KISS" rule hit up your parts fiche to meet your parts requirements. Tune the "Brake system" as a Package to fit your needs. Knowing that everyone else will require different expectations. Your quote of this is exactly what I am mentioning of a brake system being a package deal "Even a master cylinder change may not alter caliper feel if it's flex or maybe some grabby nature." That is why some racers buy the expensive billet calipers with special rotors, pads and M/C to fit their needs. My experience and others' is only that, and may not fit your needs in your mass production of a brake package.

Personnally, I thought that the F series ninja (87-88)had a good caliper for the street cruising scene. Small leading piston followed by the larger piston. You still had to dial it in as far as pads go, but it worked well.

 

First, let's see... seems the Eliminator had the ZX900 Ninja engine in it, so I'd say not overly engineering.

Now here is a "non-descript Tokico caliper":

Versus a good looking Nissin:

or Sumitomo:

So, now you may understand why I call it "non-descript". It's just plain plain.

Then for true overkill, but plenty of bling there are the six piston calipers:


Like I said, I've been through the Kawasaki schematics and know what is where. Seems those plain calipers have been used on ZX 6/7/11 from about 93-98 as assemblies, so they're fairly common. I also know about the master cylinder sizing. I know the six pistons are for flash and that the four pistons will work fine.

What I don't know is how well any of them actually work in comparison except for what I've learned from peoples' experience. I appreciate what you've said about the late 80s differenciated calipers (again the Kaws were non-descript, where the GSXR had more attractive Nissins and score well with some of the ZXR guys), but I'm not so sure of availability readily. The calipers need to be readily available for riders to pick up. If you have experience with the newer stuff I'd love to hear it.

I have read a fair amount about six piston calipers, but very little about any four piston calipers. What would be ideal would be to encounter someone who has ridden the mid/late ninties ZXs, CBRs, and YZFs to get their opinions on just how the calipers, within their respective packages, work.

We will be working with brake pads and master cylinder set ups a bit after doing some adapter plates. I'm kind of looking forward to it with the Zephyr this spring.