Hey guys, Stephanie with americanmuscle.com here with an overview of the Ford Performance
six-piston front brake upgrade kit for the 2015 and newer S550 Mustang.
In this video we're going to go over a few things with this kit.
We're going to talk about who this is going to be an upgrade for, the components of this
kit, and the install as well.
I'll go over the install in more detail later, but I'll tell you now that the install for
this is going to be a two out of three wrenches on the scale.
It's not too difficult, but it's not for the first-time wrencher either.
The Ford Performance six-piston front brake upgrade kit is going to be something that
you should check out if you didn't opt for the Performance Pack model when you purchased
your S550 but you want the benefit of that extra stopping power that the Performance
Pack brakes offer.
If you didn't pick up a Performance Pack model, you ended up with a four-piston brake setup.
This kit and the Performance Pack cars offer a six-piston caliper and slightly larger rotors,
and this doesn't sound like much when I say it but it does make a significant difference
in stopping performance.
This kit is going to appeal to a couple of different types of owners.
It's obviously going to appeal to those S550 owners who track their cars, but it's even
going to appeal to those who don't.
Big brake kits are an excellent upgrade if your car sees mostly street time, and this
kit is perfect for those of you that are looking for a huge upgrade in stopping power over
your base factory setup.
If you're looking for a solid all-inclusive upgrade from Ford Racing and Brembo, this
is the ticket.
As far as brake kits and brake upgrades go, bigger does tend to be better.
Braking performance depends on surface area, and by this I mean how much surface area the
brake pads have to bite into.
Larger discs and larger pads have more surface area and therefore allow for shorter, faster
stops simply because of the bite that the brakes will have.
On top of that, increased surface area means better heat dispersal, and with brakes you
want as little heat as possible if you want highly effective stopping power.
Because this kit is actually original equipment for the Performance Pack cars, this is a bolt
on front brake kit that's going to come complete with all of the items that you need for the
upgrade.
The kit offers these big boy six-piston calipers, 15-inch Brembo front rotors, front brake pads
and dust shields, and install hardware as well.
Like I mentioned earlier, six-piston calipers are going to be an upgrade over the four-piston
calipers.
That's going to be another two pistons for each side pushing that pad and creating a
greater wider clamping force.
The upgrade in pistons does mean a tip in brake bias though, so that's just something
that you have to keep in mind.
These front calipers are going to require a greater amount of fluid as well.
Moving on to the brake pads, the pads are an important piece of the puzzle here.
They are a component that's going to be directly in contact with the friction surface, so you
want to make sure that you're getting the right brake pads for your application and
for your rotors.
These are 15-inch iron rotors which are vented.
Venting the rotors is a way to cool the rotors since the friction between the pads and the
rotors is going to create heat and gases and dust.
The vents give a place for all of this to escape to, which then means more contact surface
area for the brake pad and that means better braking and less brake fade.
Since these rotors and pads are already kitted for you and you know that they come factory
in the Performance Pack cars, you know that you're getting components that are going to
work well together.
Ford has taken the guesswork out of the equation there.
These are going to be your main components of this kit.
The caliper and the rotor combo will give a ton of surface area for more stopping power
and better heat dissipation.
On average, the front brakes are handling roughly 75% of the braking duties, so when
you make this kind of upgrade, the difference should be immediately noticeable.
My one nitpick with this kit though would be that it doesn't include stainless steel
brake lines.
You'll be getting the stock factory lines, which isn't the end of the world, but I would've
liked to have seen new stainless steel lines in place of the factory replacements.
But in all honesty, this is a factory upgrade kit, so I'm not really all that surprised
that it doesn't come with aftermarket lines.
On the topic of price, you're looking at a $1300 price tag for this kit.
This may sound a touch expensive, but in the world of big brake upgrade kits this is actually
very budget friendly.
You are upgrading the factory components here but this is still a big upgrade for all the
non-Performance Pack Mustangs out there.
Not to mention, if you're interested in any other kit, you're looking at spending more
than double the price for those.
Installing a kit like this is definitely not for the first-time wrencher out there.
To give a general overview of the install, you're first going to want to double check
that you won't have any clearance issues with your wheels.
These brakes require that you have 19-inch wheels or larger or else you're going to be
looking at clearance problems, so just keep that in mind.
I say that this isn't for the first-time wrencher because you will need to bleed the brakes
properly in addition to physically installing the kit, so therefore I'll call it a two out
of three wrenches on the difficulty meter.
I'm not going to give it a full three out of three because it's really not rocket science,
but if you've never bled brakes before, you might want to get some help on this one because
brakes are kind of important.
Either way, figure a few hours in the garage, a decent socket and wrench set along with
the necessary bleeding tools, and don't forget fresh brake fluid to finish the job.
Wrapping things up here with the Ford Performance six-piston front brake upgrade kit, this is
a serious braking upgrade for the base model S550s that cannot currently be beat in price.
This kit'll upgrade you to six-piston calipers and 15-inch vented rotors.
As always, I suggest you check it out more online for yourself and for all things Mustang
keep it right here at americanmuscle.com.