No more aluminum drums for 240/260/280z cars

[JeffYoung]

Brembo apparently quit making them. The suppliers have a replacement, but it is not aluminum. Buy up the few remaining now, and stash'em!

[pballance]

3 weeks ago there were 3 drums in Nissan inventory in the US. $185 ea as I recall.

[Ron Earp]

Thanks for the heads up on that Paul/Jeff.

Even steel ones are not "easily" found. I called four places and came up empty on ally and steel. Fifth place could get steel drums. Prices on the ally ones are through the roof now.

Ron

[JeffYoung]

Hell, you told me about it Ron.

The website I sent you this morning (Ron) said that Brembo stopped production, but that a replacement (Asian) supplier had been found and would start up soon, although the replacements will be steel.

[pballance]

FWIW, I found out before the Barber race. I located some good used ones, latched on to them so I think I am OK for a while. I tried to order from 4 of the usual suppliers but all were out of stock even though they said they were in stock.

There is a guy on ebay with 7 drums I think. He is asking $349/pair for them. Too rich for me.

Looks like the ZX might get built sooner rather than later.............

Now, how about a class philosphy question.

IF the drums, even steel ones are NLA, that will effectively end the Z in ITS. Please correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think the ITAC would approve an upgrade to discs for the drum equipped Z's.

Just thinking out loud........ Could a weight penalty offset an upgrade from Z drums to ZX rear disc brakes? Of course there is the follow on questions regarding larger M/C, etc., etc, etc..........

[JeffYoung]

Paul, this won't be allowed. It's actually happened before, to a fairly popular car. RX2s/3s used to be pretty popular in ITA but have disappeared. A guy on here who raced one explained a lot of that was due to rear brake drums/wheel cylinders/etc. no longer being available.

I don't think the ITAC/CRB would allow a disc upgrade for the Z cars, but complicating the equation is the sheer number, still, of these cars racing in ITS. Sometimes they make up 1/3 of teh field. I bet 240z/260z/early 280z are the second most popular ITS car, still, after the second Gen RX7......

[Ron Earp]

Yeah, there won't be any converting to drums. I'd be up for converting to discs at a slightly higher weight, but if you bring it up you'll be told to run production if you want to "get heavy into modifying your race car". We really need a shift in class terms - IT as it current is needs to be called "Production" since it is far closer to "Production cars". Production, or Prod, as it is now needs to be called "Improved Touring" or something that lets people know the machines are not anywhere near production cars.

In any event, I'm sure steel ones will be available and they are not a deal breaker. I weighed the steel vs ally ones and I think the difference was about five pounds if I recall correctly.

R