Brake upgrade - DIY or MRC?

[bobbler]

Bonus due in a couple of weeks so gonna do the brakes.

Is it an easy enough job to replace the calipers and disks myself at all?

I have done pad changes before and got a decent enough set of tools, jacks and axle stands to have a go.
Any special tools I would need on top of standard stuff?

Any ideas on rough number of hours someone like MRC would need to do them? If its going to be a couple of hours labour vs buying a load of tools then it might work out better.

[MarkB]

I think it would be about 2 hours labour but best to speak to them

Nothing that hard though you do need to bleed the brakes after.

[david7m]

I very rarely mess with brakes. If your engine blows up then fair enough, but if your brakes fail, you are quite simply........SCREWED!

If you are supplying the parts, then 3 hours at MRC @ £60 ph (or what ever it is) would be worth it in my opinion!

Dave

[bobbler]

Yeah I suppose you are correct. I am confident to an extent of doing it right, just if its going to need extras that I dont have that would be better off in Doug etc pockets as I doubt I would use a brake bleed tool (or whatever it is called) again.
Will give them a bell next week and see if I can get her booked in. Its a nice drive out either way

[Jarv]

There is a third option. I don't want to tempt business away from MRC, they are top guys, but a tad overqualified for brake upgrades. I don't know how far away from Banbury you are, if it's on your doorstep then fair enough. I have a local mechanic with a workshop behind some shops. He's perfect for this kind of job. I gave him all the parts for my Brembo upgrade and he fitted it.

[bobbler]

Oh its a fair ways, I live in Bath so IIRC about 80 miles each way. Its just I was probably going to go with them to purchase the brakes from anyway and prefer the idea of keeping things under one roof.
May try the guys who do my servicing instead...should save me £60 of fuel too then LOL.

[dazzer]

Didn't littleblue have a stage 4 set of brakes (Porker Cayenne) for sale. Good price by all accounts.

[>RS4<]

Yes he did...sent him a PM some time ago but no reply....

[Peakz]

AFAIK littleblue sold the brakes a while ago.

[ajsl]

To give you a rough idea, I had a set of B5 RS4 front disks and calipers fitted by Star Performance a week or so ago to my S4. It came to 1.5 hours labour including bleeding the brakes etc.

Though it was probably overkill to up to Star, I'd rather have my car somewhere where I trust the guys.. Especially when it comes to brakes.

[jc..]

brakes aren't difficult to fit. depends how competant you are. I would never pay £180 to have some calipers and discs fitted. bleeding is not hard either, but if you are at all unsure about that any tyres fitters will give you a fully pressurised brake bleed for pennies.

I put together a package of brake upgrades for my B5, porshce calipers and pads with delivery mileage sourced from german ebay, discs (Mercedes) sourced from the web, new fluid and a pair of caliper brackets knocked up my my favourite machine shop. (got a spare strut for measuring and test fitting everything) very satisfying to do it yourself.