Brake help

[h3towel]

Hello all,
I've been driving my car around for about a year now. The car stops, but the brakes have always felt spongy. I just chalked it up to them being the OEM brakes and not being boosted. Just got my car back from paint today (Mike from spotlight customs did an absolutely amazing job) and was told by the delivery guy that he thought I either had air in the line, or the fluid was bypassing the seals in the cylinders. I looked on the inter web dot com for the tell tale signs that the seals were being bypassed. I don't feel like that is the issue. I have also bled the brakes over and over and over... and they feel the exact same. Any ideas or solutions?

[mladen]

People more experienced than me will chime in as well, but could it be something to do with the setting of the balance bar and PC piston travel? Also, have you tried re-bleeding the brakes?

[h3towel]

I have the balance bar set completely to the front. I think the piston travel is ok since the pedal doesn't hit the floor. I have bled the brakes probably a dozen times.

[Gordon Levy]

What calipers for you have? Are they on the correct sides?

[h3towel]

The calipers that came with the complete kit. The bleeder valves are on the top, so I'm assuming they are on the correct sides. I recently bought the wilwood 6 piston calipers, but haven't installed them yet.

[CraigS]

Why would you have the balance completely to the front? I'd move it to the middle and see how that feels. Two reasons. 1- FFRs generally need more rear brake rather than less. 2- The balance bar can only move to so much of an angle looked at from the top. Beyond that it binds either in the top of the pedal or in the clevises. Also be sure the MC pushrods are adjusted properly. Usually the MC pistons will move a different distance one MC to the other. So the pushrods need to be adjusted to have the balance bar reasonably close to a 90 degree angle compared to the pushrods when you have the brakes pushed hard. You can sometimes end up w/ the pushrod lengths set so the balance bar is at an angle at rest and, as more pedal pressure is applied it goes to 90 deg and then a little past that at full foot pressure.

[egchewy79]

if the brake pedal doesn't fade when you push down, it's likely not air in the line. have you properly bedded the brakes yet? I'm guessing you have enough miles on it now that they are bedded. lastly, consider swapping out pads from grippier ones like Hawks.

[AC Bill]

So few people drive a vehicle without power brakes these days. I expect near anyone driving your roadster for the first time. may think the brakes are fishy.
In my younger years I always drove vehicles with non-power brakes, but then after a couple of decades of driving with power brakes, my roadster's non-power brakes felt odd.
I went through the system, double checking everything, re-bleeding, etc., and could find nothing wrong.
The car stopped just fine, I just had to re-learn to push the brake pedal harder. They got a good test out when two deer leaped in front of my car, and I hammered the pedal.