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After forging the Trophy calipers are CNC machined to reduce weight in a secondary operation. You can see much of the CNC created lightening pocketing in the picture above. The ST60 caliper has durability enhancing features like stainless steel abutments to prevent the brake pads steel backing plates from digging into the caliper body and high-temperature silicone rubber dust seals that protect the main seals from dirt and ensure a long service life. Most racing type calipers have no dust seals which creates the need to frequently rebuild them if the car sees a lot of street long-term use.
Additionally, and which is perhaps StopTechs biggest competitive advantage in the market, is that StopTech makes their caliper pistons in 1mm increments. This allows StopTech to proportion each brake kit to hydraulically match the OEM brake system exactly. This assures that ABS and various electronic vehicle stability control and proportioning systems will still function correctly as designed by the manufacturer. Other manufacturers of big brake systems have at the most 3 piston sizes to choose from.
StopTech also does extensive on car tests to validate the brakes’ performance including repeated high speed stops with temperature monitoring, stopping while turning and a J-Turn test to assure vehicle dynamic system compatibility with the more powerful brakes. To our knowledge, no other aftermarket big brake upgrade company does more intensive validation and electronic compatibility testing than StopTech.
We attended StopTech’s testing in the past – it is a real good read!
Part 2 of the article showing how StopTech does on track validation.
