Is it possible to move from drum to disc brakes?

[Ske]

Evening,

Not sure if this is a dumb question or not but would it be possible to change the rear drum brakes on my Fiesta to disc ones? Is it complex? Realistically, how much would it cost to convert?

Cheers,

Ske

[Luke4efc]

I believe the ST have disks on the back. Should therefore be a straight swap as I doubt they would change anything else, however I have seen people change the whole rear axle on some smaller cars. Basically if the hubs are the same fitment the. It should bolt on. Best bet would be to find stuff from a breakers rather than buying new. Going new will run you at least £500. Looks like calipers are £40-50 a pop on eBay, plus you've got the hubs, disks and pads. Don't have time to look around for exact pricing, sorry. It's not that hard to do a quick search on eBay. Plus I'm sure people will have done it before.

It's basically an expensive cosmetric upgrade that nobody will notice unless you point it out. It doesn't have any performance benefit as something like 70% of the braking power goes to the front wheels. Also have to remember your handbrake might not be as effective on disks.

If it's just hub replacement, should be an easy enough job. I mean you have to know what you're doing, if you've ever done something like a wheel bearing, you can do this, but that's kind of obvious. Garages will charge more than you'll want to pay for this sort of work.

[Ske]

Appreciate the reply, Luke. Thank you.

[MJNewton]

If it was the cosmetic aspect of having drum brakes that is the driver here (which is a fair enough reason) then you might want to consider just painting the drums black. This pretty much hides them and so whilst you won't have a disc and caliper visible it becomes less obvious that you have drum brakes, if you see what I mean. I painted my wife's drums, more because I didn't like seeing the surface corrosion, and afterwards it struck me how much better the whole wheel ended up looking.

[Luke4efc]

2 hours ago, MJNewton said:

If it was the cosmetic aspect of having drum brakes that is the driver here (which is a fair enough reason) then you might want to consider just painting the drums black.

Rear calipers do look awesome, but it's one of those mods that you have to explain to people who don't know cars. Red calipers give you +10hp each btw, they look awesome no matter what with black alloys. That being said, if you do stick with drums on the back, please don't paint them red, it's looks awful.

[AlexBartlam]

i painted mine black, heat resistant spray paint, easy to do, and looks the dogs gonads hides well and now i cant see a brown drum every time i go outside

[Ske]

That's a very good shout - didn't think of that!