drums vs. discs.

[gw84]

I was reading up on luminas recently and someone had written that a change from '98 to '99 was "luminas lost rear disc brakes in favor of drums" However, I was looking at my '99 LTZ and noticed that it has discs. Is it true that '99's have rear drums and LTZ's are the exception (having discs)? Or was the statement that I read wrong?

[tblake]

yeah, ltz's have disks, my 2001 base sedan has rear drums, wanna trade? I hate drums. Disks look so much better.

[jeffcoslacker]

Disc/drum Luminas could sure use the extra stopping power...it's better now after I discovered that issue with the adjusters on the rear, but I still have doubts about the way the brake system is biased on these...my rear shoes are still nowhere near worn out at 128,000 miles...that seems odd to me, of course the front pads last me 60,000, which is a lot for a FWD car also...and I am a VERY sparing brake user...

Brakes are for stopping, IMO. If you use your brakes to slow heading into a curve, you entered too fast (or you need to learn how to apex a turn), if you are constantly braking in traffic, you are overrunning the conditions, need to hang back and anticipate better, etc...

Hate seeing brake lights on the highway....it's a highway, dammit! we're supposed to be going, not slowing!

[Blue Bowtie]

And it doesn't help that the brake bias is terrible on most cars, Lumis included. A little tweaking of the springs on the RP checks and prop valves can usually get a little more rear braking into the scheme, but you need to be careful not to go too far since the rears can lock so easily. Its a lot easier to balance out disc/disc systems.

[gw84]

Originally Posted by gw84

I was reading up on luminas recently and someone had written that a change from '98 to '99 was "luminas lost rear disc brakes in favor of drums" However, I was looking at my '99 LTZ and noticed that it has discs. Is it true that '99's have rear drums and LTZ's are the exception (having discs)? Or was the statement that I read wrong?

look I quoted myself
If the disc/disc setup is better than the disc/drum why would they say "luminas lost rear disc brakes in favor of drums"? Is it money? Did GM need to save some cash or what?

[jeffcoslacker]

Originally Posted by gw84

look I quoted myself
If the disc/disc setup is better than the disc/drum why would they say "luminas lost rear disc brakes in favor of drums"? Is it money? Did GM need to save some cash or what?

Yup. Drums cheaper, less service warrantee hassle....Drum brakes will typically go 100,000 miles without ever causing problems or needing replacement, whereas rear discs make noises, act funny, get stuck on w/parking brake, etc etc...usually due to operator error, but they are stuck fixing it under warrantee for the first few years, plus a set of pads, blah, blah....drum just sit back there and don't bother anybody...huge numbers of Luminas were sold to become fleet and rental vehicles too, fleets and rentals don't want rear disc brakes, they want basic and reliable...