Yeah it was more rust than the parking brake shoes. I used bolts to break the first mm then I just kept whacking it back and forth with a rubber mallet until I got it turned all the way around and loose enough for me to pull off the rotor by hand. Only took a few minutes each side at most.


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Nice write up! The runner looks great. I am in the Houston area near Conroe , when I get back from Ft. Hood I have a bunch of projects lined up for my 4Runner too. Where did you find the rear brake lines to the caliper?


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Nice write-up. I am planning to replace the center lines soon. So by using the supplies plugs did you still have to bleed the breaks after installing the new lines? Just wondering what the process is if you don't do calipers at the same time. Sent from my Fire Phone using Tapatalk

You need to bleed the brakes anytime you open up a brake line section, disconnect a caliper, or open a bleed screw. There can be no air in the system.

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Time to tackle the front brakes. I did this over the course of 3 days, breaking up into several steps since I didn't want to spend 5-6 hours potentially on one step. Good thing too, I needed to run to the store a few times in between steps. Plus weekend activities got in the way.


The nice frozen stock caliper, only one piston that perpetually keeps my car from getting 18-19 mpgs.


Surprisingly the calipers were quite easy to remove. It was the lines that gave me some trouble. Removed the top bracket to give me some working space with the spring clip. Same with the lower one.


Both rotors gave me trouble, completely rust welded to the hub. Regular rubber mallet did nothing. The driver one came off using the bolt and nut trick. The passenger didn't budge at all so I had to use two whacks with a mini-sledge to get it off.


You guys can see where the bolts hit the rotor to push it off.




The 2 piece Stoptech aero rotor with RacingBrake 355 mm ring is actually not that much larger than the stock 4th gen sport brake rotor. It is roughly 0.5" or even slightly less than that in diameter. The only advantage this kit gets me is lighter weight rotor and larger calipers. The pad area is also increased.




Had to cut most of the dust shield to fit the new rotors. The new diameter was enough that I couldn't just fit them over the dust shield. Tin snips do not make the best cutting tool but took maybe 30 minutes per side, which added to the overall job time.



I was pretty careful with the disposal of the pieces of the dust shield. Definitely didn't want a trip to the hospital if they were to cut through my gloves.


SOS Performance supplied the brackets and hardware required for the install.



Test fitted everything before moving forward with the lines and everything.


The calipers are just on the brackets for the moment. I need to ceramic coat them before I button everything up and since I didn't want the coating to get onto the rotors I took them off.


Tucked her in for the night

Since the Runner was down and I wanted to run a few errands, I made use of my hatchback for once. Had to stop at Home Depot for a grinding attachment and then Discount so they could mount my tire to my spare wheel.





They were a bit annoying at first because they kept saying that they couldn't mount the tire. They kept insisting that the wheel was a car wheel. Don't mind that it's six lugs and that I have four of the same ones at home. Then they also continued to tell me that I had to pay to mount the tire, even though I bought all 5 tires from them previously.





I'll get it color matched down the road. I just want to have a full size spare just in case, especially on road trips. Can't be waiting for AAA all the time.



I'll probably just put this one under the 3rd gen since the old wheels went onto it.



Away with grinding the sharp edges off the dust shields.





I get to reuse the lines off the 3rd gen kit as well as the rotors pictured in the previous post. As you can see, it is a complete ss line from hard line to caliper. One less connection to deal with I suppose.



Applied the Ceramic Pro 9H early morning to protect the shiny new calipers. Worked really well too because all the brake fluid that came out of the bleed process beaded right off. No harm to the finish and just needed to clean the aftermath with isopropyl alcohol.



You can see the water beading on the q-tip I used to get into the nooks and crannies.





I like using the allen screws over the stock pin setup. The original driver side was completely rusted for me. I couldn't even get them off when I was doing the pad job last month while waiting for the calipers to come in.



Don't mind the rusty rotors. They were sitting on my 3rd gen for four months. I'll probably polish the screws at some point but really probably won't think about it again.



In retrospect, I might regret going with red but then I wanted to look more TRD. I thought about blue but I could always do that with the IS300 for the F sport blue.



Next up will be the upper / lower control arms. I already have the uppers, I just didn't have time to do it all in one go. Maybe one day I might do the SOS rear brake kit, but for now the 5th gen will be serviceable for a long time. Rear BBKs on most forums are more for the bling than the function...or are they?

NICE!!...

Thanks! But bro, yours is so much nicer than mine by leap years. I have yours bookmarked on my Excel build sheet for inspiration

Thanks man.

Nice job! I like how the StopTech has a removable bridge so the that pads can be serviced without caliper removal. This is a feature lost with the Wilwoods that I upgraded with and will require removal to get to the pads.

Love how the rotor looks with those bronze wheels.

I thought the fronts were for bling too. I mean I can lock up the brakes and screech the 35" tires, this kit won't make me stop quicker will it? Just less fade right, and maybe more responsive feel, stronger blingier materials?

It does increase the braking response and for our applications fade is not really a thing. The slotted rotors help with the initial bite a lot. Overall I wouldn't have installed the BBK if I didn't already have 70% of the parts laying around already from my previous rig. My experience using it previously was so positive that I would have spent about the same amount on 5th gen rotors / calipers / pads vs reusing my previous rotors / lines with the new brackets with the exchange to the ST60 calipers. Braking distance improved on my old rig by 15-20 feet but it'll be less since the 4th gen is much heavier. I still need to bed my pads before I know for sure how much it has improved. No one ever said the stock system wasn't up to the job. Isn't that why we're on the forum? Incremental improvements?

And also the rears barely do any of the braking so the fronts would be a justified upgrade for any car not just the 4Runner. We already spend tons elsewhere already. I figure with suspension performance some extra budget can be done to the brakes as well.


On a side note, I guess bleeding the system of 500 mL of fluid got rid of the weird squish noise the pedal used to make.

I guess I should say that I do agree with your statement but at least the front is functional "bling" vs. getting a rear setup where it would just be completely just for the look. Both my performance cars (RS4 and civic) had Brembo BBKs in the front and regular single piston sliding calipers in the rear. I've seen STIs, evos, and BRZ with track pack runs multi piston calipers all around. As far as braking goes, I'm sure my braking distance improved as part of the larger rotor / piston setup but also because I have better tire compound than when I first got the truck. The kit ended up doing what it did for my 3rd gen. I am quite pleased with the results.

Couple of small updates. Nothing big for a while until I get sometime to install my UCAs. I ordered some replacement bolts and ended up ordering too many or some that didn't even fit despite my best efforts to measure everything ahead of time.


It is kind of weird that they're allen bolts but I decided to go a different route for the engine bay. Hopefully I can clean up the corrosion around the bay and make it look decent. The socket cap bolts have different colored washers available if I ever wanted a more "dressed" up look but I think I'm fine with just the stainless steel bolts. I'll make a list of all the bolts I replace once I get through the whole engine bay (includes stuff like grounding points, valve cover bolts, acorn nuts, ect...)




Cleaned up all the dust and grease build up on the coil packs. Tossed out the anti-seize after being reminded by @07V8 that TSB says not to use it. Don't know how much mileage was on the old plugs but placebo effect says the new ones are working out great.



Looks a little better. If I refinish the valve covers it'll probably look almost 80% better. I do want to refinish the oil fill pedestal at least.


I also had enough left over from my fender washers to properly secure the cover to the Volante intake. The previous owner must have lost the original screws because the replacements were about 1/8" off from sealing the cover properly.


Then the latter part of my week off was spent going to Ikea twice to get cabinets to start my garage organizing project. This was a nifty thing they have where there are tubs of hardware that is universal across most Ikea products. I guess this prevents people from returning things due to missing hardware. This was helpful for me, since I had a shelf I bought years ago brand new and some how lost the hardware to assemble it.




I ended up deciding on taller cabinets after realizing how much more potential storage space I might need. I do realize its going to look worse before it gets better. I hope to have all my car detailing supplies, aquarium maintenance, automotive parts, and tools hidden away in the cabinets once I'm done. I'll have to live with shuffling things around until I finish this long term project. I'm funding most of it with the sales of extra car parts. Doubles as funds and clearing up space.

Not pictured is the arrival of my Gibson exhaust. It's been raining all week so I couldn't get under the car to work on getting the exhaust on. I also got in replacement carpet for my 3rd gen. Original carpet got all moldy from a slow leak due to a broken seal on the door. I've been rolling around without any carpet for a while now. Doesn't bother me but it might be nice to have if I decide to part ways with it. I wanted to get the interior to the 3rd gen done but alas, there's only time for so much work in a day.