Ford Explorer = 911 (rear brakes anyway)

[H20911]

So I am waiting to get my rear tires mounted and I pick up a magazine to pass the time only to find an article that is talking about a rear axle that states:

"The design of the Ford Explorer disc brake is beautifully simplistic.
The hat-style rotor slips over a miniature drum brake assembly"

Car Craft
(Jan 2002)

There was a pic that looked all too familiar with the article.

just made me laugh.....the next thing you know they will have independent rear suspensions.......oops! they do

[masraum]

don't most rear disc brakes work that way??

[Tyson Schmidt]

No. Actually, most use a screw-type caliper piston which utilizes the existing pads to grab the rotor. The German and Swedish cars usually use the drum-inside-rotor style E-brakes.

[beepbeep]

Swedish cars?

Hell no...Saab 900C handbrake works on front rotor calipers (!)...Saab 9000 utilizes handbrake wire that works on back rotor calipers.

It's first now with Saab 9-5 that they started to use conventional drum-inside disc. Volvo used drum as far as i remember tough.

Altough this approach reduces unsprung weight and is more simple, it's hard to make good E-brake that uses ordinary disc-style caliper beacuse drum-pads have a tendency to "dig-in" and thus lock the wheel.

[masraum]

Well, then Vette's must have something going for them since they also use a small drum brake inside the rotor hat. Since it takes a pretty sizeable rotor for a drum brake setup to fit inside the hat most of todays cars wouldn't really have room. I've heard that it's difficult to get a mechanical setup to work well on discs, but I guess time and technology have overcome that problem.

[Tyson Schmidt]

I was referring to Volvo's. Luckily, I've had little experience working on Saab's. About as ass-backwards of a car ever built.

[beepbeep]

...after working with Saabs Porsches suddenly looks pretty simple and straightforward. :-)

But they do have best turbocharged engines in the bussines...