Jazz86 Posted January 8, 2021 Share Posted January 8, 2021 (edited) Hello HybridZ! My 240z recently seized up its drums at the track and I thought it is time to convert to a disc brake. I went with the kit from Zcardepot and ended up adding some parts of my own as well to make it work. Here is my review and headaches and pointers from installing this kit. I will go though the process and when the issues occur will be written in chronological order. GOOD POINTS WILL BE HIGHLIGHTED IN BLUE. MEH I AM NOT MAD NOR PLEASED IN GREEN. BAD POINTS WILL BE HIGHLIGHTED IN RED. 1. Removing the Stock Drums There are tons of write ups on this. I chose to cut the back plate because I will never really go back to drums, and I have had it with the drums seizing or messing up or not adjusting right, and messing up my brake points. OEM brake lines were easy to remove since I soaked them in PB. Clips were easy with pliers, and a wrench. 2. Bolting up the ZcarDepot bracket. THE GOOD There is really only one way to bolt up the bracket and Zcardepot has many photos and write ups on this part. So here is a photo from their website(no copywrite infringement intended 😊) Both the stock bolts work and the new JNC bolts that Zcardepot supplies. 3. Bolting up the Calipers Clean up the hub and slide the rotor on. Put a lug nut on and hold the rotor to the hub surface. Now the rotor spins in line with the hub surface. With the whole caliper try bolting up to the zcar bracket. THE MEH, the calipers needed to be shimmed on the driver side caliper in order to center the rotor in the middle of the caliper slot. The passenger side is okay and did not need any shims at all. I have installed willwoods on several cars and they also required shims to get the caliper and rotors inline. SOOO thinking I would rather have to shim the caliper outward than having to grind the back plate or caliper retainer. 4. Hooking up the brake hose (hose is the flexible bit, hardline is the solid metal bit) The brake hose used are some 240sx rear brake hose, I recommend a stainless braided hose. I had some 240sx braided hose sitting from my older projects so I used those instead and they are DOT, but for a 240sx. THE BAD the idiot installing the kit ME 😂 This was my problem, caused by me but you might run into a similar issue with the normal rubber hose provided. The brake hose are quite short for the application and I recommend a brake hose that is at least 15inches long end to end. The 240sx brake hose is 12 inches end to end. The good thing is the 240sx brake hose is just long enough to clear all the critical points. 5. The handbrake.... THE BAD THE PAIN THE STRUGGLE Everything was going smoothly, up until this portion of the install. Trying to get the oem handbrake to work with the 240sx calipers. There are two options now. If you have the oem 240sx handbrake brackets (rare) you will need to make an adapter plate to link the 240sx caliper handbrake hook to the 240z handbrake cable. Here is a picture from a nice man who has a page on how to install the 240sx rear brakes from way back when. http://www.zhome.com/ZCMnL/tech/Calipers/zbrakeupgrade.htm If you have the Zcardepot 240sx handbrake brackets (provided with the kit) you still need to modify a few things. I have both but I chose to go with the zcardepot handbrake bracket. On the OEM 240z handbrake there is a flat tab, that flat tab has to sit behind the flat of the caliper handbrake bracket. The Zcar depot brackets are shorter than the 240sx OEM handbrake bracket, this makes is possible to simply hook them up. BUT HERE COMES THE BAD the driver side bracket was too long and I could never get that tab behind the flat of the zcardepot handbrake bracket. The passenger side zcardepot bracket was perfect, and the 240z OEM handbrake fit perfectly. I ended up using some shaft collars on the oem handbrake to hold the handbrake tab on the driver side. 6. CONCERNS JUSTIFIED After having bolted up everything I am really concerned with a few things. 1. The bracket for the handbrake is really close to the chassis and the OEM brake hardline. 2. The handbrake cables being too close to the drive shaft. I know you can swap sides and it fixes it, but I just used a zip tie and held the oem cable to the mustache bar. As its turned out I the bracket made contact with the mountings. here is a photo of what happened when I compressed the suspension. THE SOLUTION COMES IN THE FORM OF TWO THINGS. 1. THE BRACKETS NEED TO BE PUSHED TO THE REAR OF THE CAR AND THEN BOLTED 2. BUMP STOPS NEED TO BE THERE AT LEAST 1INCH TO KEEP THE HANDBRAKE BRACKETS FROM MUNCHING YOUR BRAKE LINES. Overall, the kit works perfectly fine. There aren't any major issues that cannot be fixed by normal means. The braking is greatly improved, with much better pedal feel and heat capacity. I am running the 280zx master cylinder as well, so that helps. BRAKE balance is just as good as properly adjusted drums, I will lock up the fronts a touch earlier than the rear, but all 4 wheels will lock up with R comp tires on the car. The rear of the Z gets a few mm increase in width because the oem drums are not as thick as the rotor.The kit gets a 7.5/10. A passing grade. Edited January 8, 2021 by Jazz86 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miles Posted January 10, 2021 Share Posted January 10, 2021 I bought the Modern Motor Sports 240SX rear disk conversion about 15 years ago. I didn't like the placement of the brake lines or the how the parking brake cable attached to the caliper. Relocated the brake lines and converted them to -3 AN lines using metric to AN adaptors Made one long hard line to go from the T connector to the driver side. Cut the hard line mounting tabs off. Made a hybrid parking cable bracket by cutting off the 240SX cable attachment and welding the 240z cable attachment in its' place. See pictures Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jazz86 Posted January 13, 2021 Author Share Posted January 13, 2021 On 1/9/2021 at 4:25 PM, Miles said: I bought the Modern Motor Sports 240SX rear disk conversion about 15 years ago. I didn't like the placement of the brake lines or the how the parking brake cable attached to the caliper. Relocated the brake lines and converted them to -3 AN lines using metric to AN adaptors Made one long hard line to go from the T connector to the driver side. Cut the hard line mounting tabs off. Made a hybrid parking cable bracket by cutting off the 240SX cable attachment and welding the 240z cable attachment in its' place. See pictures Yeah that seems like a much better proposition! I was looking into doing that instead. Though my 240z is a 1973 which is the odd year I am not sure there is a center split for the rear brake lines. It should be the same system on a 260z and 280z. But I would love to run a line from the center split directly to the caliper instead of dealing with the OEM hard-line routing. Onwards to more projects. The Zcardepot kit seems to have the same issues as your kit did from years back. Food for thought! Thank you sir! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oblithian Posted August 16, 2021 Share Posted August 16, 2021 If we are all converting it to something non-stock anyway. Why don't we all try to find some alternate calipers that would work with the rotor dimensions but with a more suitable handbrake setup? Perhaps something even cheaper and more widely available? The adapter plate is custom, but it is also the simplest component to replace/modify as needed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kym Posted January 20 Share Posted January 20 Hi, thanks for great article. Do you happen to know what rotors these are, I've got some brackets but not the whole kit. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miles Posted January 23 Share Posted January 23 (edited) On 1/20/2024 at 4:33 AM, Kym said: Hi, thanks for great article. Do you happen to know what rotors these are, I've got some brackets but not the whole kit. Cheers My kit from Modern Motor Sports (out of business) used 240sx calipers and 1984 non-turbo 300zx rotors. Edited January 23 by Miles spelling Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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