Why does Ford still use such wimpy brakes?

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Grey ghost

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You do know to flush your brake fluid once in a while don't you?it helps keep the anti lock and the pistons working.
Disc diameter and rotor thickness have a tremendous effect on braking.it doesn't make any difference if you. Have one piston or 6 as long as the total surface area is equal.
I've always thought ford did better on brakes than most others.
 

gtncpa

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Stopping distance has a lot to do with tires. In normal driving, the stock calipers work fine.

My Mustang has 6 Piston StopTechs. When not on the racetrack, they perform very similar to Ford's standard calipers. The larger calipers substantially help reduce brake fade after 20-30 minutes on a racetrack. Stock calipers and pads overheat to quick. As well as high performance pads work on the track, they are not meant for driving around town. They need to be warm to hot to work effectively.

I believe the Germans add big red calipers as "eye candy" more than performance on trucks and SUV's
 

jimp

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I'm surprised to hear someone say the Ford brakes are wimpy. I don't think anyone has gone to four piston calipers on regular builds, but I could be wrong. That's more of a performance thing. If you've ever had to panic stop with a 3rd gen Expy towing a 10k lb trailer, as long as the brakes are in proper working order, I don't think you'd say they're wimpy. I've found them to be plenty beefy.

Have to agree. 75 MPH on I 70 when I came up on a car at the side of the road, It was sister and brother in-law. 2014 Expedition and 8000 pounds of trailer and Jeep came to a very quick and controlled stop, no complaints since trailer and Jeep weigh more than the Expedition.
 

TobyU

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Stopping distance has a lot to do with tires. In normal driving, the stock calipers work fine.

My Mustang has 6 Piston StopTechs. When not on the racetrack, they perform very similar to Ford's standard calipers. The larger calipers substantially help reduce brake fade after 20-30 minutes on a racetrack. Stock calipers and pads overheat to quick. As well as high performance pads work on the track, they are not meant for driving around town. They need to be warm to hot to work effectively.

I believe the Germans add big red calipers as "eye candy" more than performance on trucks and SUV's
The average person in a normal passenger the car will never experience brake fade.
If you are towing a trailer that is large or does not have it's on proper braking system that is working correctly then you could. But since I would guess that on average fewer than 20% of the cars on the road are towing anything whatsoever this makes the chances even less that someone will actually have to use the brakes in a situation other than a normal stop that might cause brake fade. You either have to ride brakes for a while or make several very hard stops in a short. Of time. You can be going a hundred fifty miles an hour and stop super hard and not have any brake fade because it's just one stop.
I used to race the roads all the time but by race I mean drag race. It was all about light to light and going. It was not about stopping. You always hoped you would be able to stop but it wasn't something you did often. Normally after a race you let off and coasted anyways and often talked back and forth between cars. There was never any hard stopping and we don't believe in cornering.
Edit: I will give a good word of advice that it is not a good idea to drag race in areas you are unfamiliar with. I was once racing an 86 or 87 Grand National in a city about 25 or 30 miles away from me. The guy was local and do the road and I did not. I, however, was not going to let him beat me. I was in a 67 GTO with a very well-built Pontiac 400 with a 411 positraction Detroit Locker in the rear end and the car was much faster than a stock Grand National.
Now what I do love Grand Nationals and have owned two of them and currently have one the owners had a slight Touch of what all the Mustang GT owners had back in the 80s and early 90s. They thought they were tough because they had a puppy little Factory car. These guys didn't know what it meant to build a real engine. So we used to pull up beside Grand Nationals point at the fender for the badge said Grand National and when they roll down the window or look at us I would say "Nah, I don't see anything Grand about it".
I would just give Mustang drivers to evil eye or call their car a *************. But since I was GM guy at heart I wasn't quite as cruel to the gym guys.
But anyway we were doing about a hundred fifteen and came up over a slight hill on this big wide six-lane Road and it ended!
You had to go left or right oh, unless you wanted to blast through a guardrail and hit god-knows-what.
Now the Grand Nationals didn't have the best braking system because the power Master System could fail at any time but an 86 Grand National with front disc brakes certainly had more stopping and then my heavier 67 GTO with 4-wheel drums. I will say it was the best muscle car brake system I have ever had in my life. It was the freest Wheeling car with less parasitic drag that I've ever seen and it stopped excellently evenly, and never locked up any Wheels.
But he knew it was coming and I didn't! I was already about a car length and 1/2 in front of him but he knew how much room he had and I didn't. So when I saw it I got on the brakes hard and was barely able to slow that thing down to make a big swooping left hand turn.
Some moral of the story, know your area and Terrain before getting into an impromptu drag race out of town.
 
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Penumbra

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15FAAB2D-67E8-4621-BF40-A6FDB61E9888.jpeg Expy stock brakes are just ok. I’ve had much better braking on my 2015 T-350. My 2013 Explorer Sport was horrible in brake handling. I had a 1998 and 2003 E-350 with v-10’s that performed very well breaking with load from high speeds as well.
I tow and travel all over the US with my family so breaking is important. Less upgrading to oversized rotors and 6 piston calipers which is expensive you can upgrade rotors and pads to get a night and day difference in brake performance.

Plus I have a 33.5” tire which affected breaking performance considerably.

I have Stoptech cryos with Hawk reds up front and yellows in the rear (they don’t make reds for the rear). The attachment here is for either front or rear only. Of course do both.

View attachment 30738

29CE7F58-32AC-4DDA-9644-4B0ED1430D81.jpeg
 
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wingrider

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View attachment 30739 Expy stock brakes are just ok. I’ve had much better braking on my 2015 T-350. My 2013 Explorer Sport was horrible in brake handling. I had a 1998 and 2003 E-350 with v-10’s that performed very well breaking with load from high speeds as well.
I tow and travel all over the US with my family so breaking is important. Less upgrading to oversized rotors and 6 piston calipers which is expensive you can upgrade rotors and pads to get a night and day difference in brake performance.

Plus I have a 33.5” tire which affected breaking performance considerably.

I have Stoptech cryos with Hawk reds up front and yellows in the rear (they don’t make reds for the rear). The attachment here is for either front or rear only. Of course do both.

View attachment 30738

View attachment 30740

What year Expy do you have? I have a '12 and would consider different rotors and pads from StopTech. I run them on my track car so I'd stay StopTech vs mixing w/ Hawk pads.
 

TobyU

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They must have gotten worse with new ones then. Our 2000 Expedition has excellent brakes. Probably the best of any of our vehicles.
 

HawkX66

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My 07 EB brakes are excellent and my 17 Platinum's brakes are even better. I've owned quite a few different vehicles including an 05 F350 diesel that I plowed driveways with and daily drove for five years. I now drive an SLK350 with the AMG and Sports package. My 17 is not my Benz obviously, but for the beast it is, the brakes are awesome. My point with naming off a couple of my vehicles is just that I know what good brakes are. Especially with my Hayabusa which has unbelievable brakes. Obviously apples and oranges in that case.
Something a lot of folks seem to be missing also is that the brakes on our Expys are dual piston calipers. That's a big upgrade from the single piston calipers that have always been run and still are on most stock vehicles. I drive in D.C. traffic three days each week. If that isn't a true test of brakes nothing is.
 
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