Tiburon Brake Upgrade - Submitted by SWortham

Estimated time: Two hours.

It includes two 11" Tiburon rotors re-drilled for 4 lugs, two Tiburon single-piston calipers, and OEM Tiburon brake pads. The advantages over the stock brakes are obvious. The stock rotors are 10.1" in diameter for both the GT and GLS models, so the Tiburon's rotors are a 0.9" improvement. On top of that, the Tiburon rotors are designed with superior venting, and the Tiburon calipers are significantly bigger and grab harder thanks to improved surface area. This kit can be installed on an '01+ Elantra GLS, GT sedan, or GT hatchback since all of them have the same brakes up front. These brakes will fit inside the stock 15" steel wheels, but not the 15" alloy wheels.

What you'll need for the installation:
- DOT 3 or DOT 4 brake fluid
- brake cleaner
- another person to help bleed the brakes
- metric socket set w/ a ratchet
- flathead screwdriver
- phillips screwdriver
- pliers

These are the stock brakes. Of course those are 17" wheels covering them up so they look especially small in this picture.



1. OK, your first step is going to be getting the car up on jack stands and taking the wheels off. Then before you take anything apart, you should pry the piston in the caliper into an open position. This can be done with just a flathead screwdriver or a piston compressor. Then grab a cup with enough water in it to dilute the brake fluid. Remember that brake fluid will eat through cheap plastic cups, paint, etc, so be careful. Remove the bolt that holds the brake line into the caliper and let it drip into the cup. The brake line should be completely disconnected from the caliper.



2. Then remove the two bolts on the back side of the caliper that hold it on. It should then just slide off, and you can set it aside.

Note: In the picture below I followed a few different steps because this was a fitment test for me. So you'll notice that the brake line is still attached and the caliper is being supported by a bungee cord, but don't worry about that because I can now verify fitment and so you don't have to go through those extra steps.



3. Now that you've removed the caliper, the stock rotors just have two screws you need to remove and then the rotor will slide off.

Here you can see a side-by-side comparison of the Tiburon rotors (on the left) and the stock rotors.



4. Before you install the new rotors, you'll need to bend back the rotor shield so they'll fit. It's that black piece of metal you see in the picture just behind the right side of the rotor. Normally, it curves around the stock rotor, but I just bent it and made it flat so it won't touch the new larger rotors.

After that, the Tiburon rotors will slide on just as easy as the old ones came off. However you won't be able to use those little screws you took off previously because of the way the holes line up. But don't worry about that, the screws don't serve much purpose since the wheels do a perfect job of keeping the rotors flush and straight. Also, you can't use those screws at all with most aftermarket wheels.

You might need to bolt the wheel back on temporarily to make sure the rotor is actually shoved back all the way and completely straight.

And that's a side-by-side comparison of the calipers (the cleaner ones are the Tiburon calipers).



5. Spray the new rotor with some brake cleaner. Now you can bolt the new calipers on just like you removed the old ones. But don't worry about the pads yet, just get the calipers bolted on there. Then you can unbolt the smaller bolt found on the back of caliper which will allow the caliper to swing up as you see in the picture. From there, you can slide the metal pieces that came with the brake pads into the caliper assembly. Then slide the brake pads in there. Try not to touch the face of the brake pads because brake pads and body oil don't mix. If you do touch them, spray them with brake cleaner before installing them. Once they are in there, you can swing the caliper back down and bolt it up again. Then connect the brake line to the new caliper.



6. Now spin the rotors by hand to make sure they spin freely. If it's all OK, then you need to follow the same process for the other side of the car.



7. After you've finished the other side, you need to bleed the brakes. To do this, you need something like you see in the picture. We used a 2-liter bottle that we filled up half way with water. And I had some plastic tubing that worked pretty well. A smaller rubber hose similar to a windshield wiper fluid hose would be ideal. You can just open up the bleeder valve and connect the hose to the valve and submerge the other end in the water inside the bottle. Then get someone to get in the car to push the brakes. They will have to press the brakes 3 times, then hold. And you can open the valve to let the fluid out as you watch for bubbles coming out the hose. Your goal is to rid the system of air bubbles. So repeat the process until you don't see anymore bubbles come out of the hose.

Follow these same steps for the other side of the car.



8. Now that you've bled the brakes, you need to open the cap for the brake fluid reservoir and pour in some new fluid. Just pour in the fluid until you see the level reach somewhere between the Min and Max levels marked on the reservoir. When you're doing this, try to remember not to leave the brake fluid bottle open for long and the same goes for the reservoir.

Now you're done with the brake install. Just bolt the wheels back on (preferably with a torque wrench at 75 ft-lbs). Start the car and try rolling it slightly and getting a feel for the brakes to make sure they're working properly. If everything is OK, then go for a drive and remember to take it easy. At first just make sure they're working like you'd expect. Once you're comfortable, you can start breaking them in. This involves several sessions of 35 to 5 mph braking (firm braking, not locking the wheels kind of braking). Allow a minute or two between brake sessions to allow cooling. You need to find some place without much traffic where you can continue this process at higher speeds. You'll need to work your way up to 60 mph to 5 mph braking. In total, you can break them in with about 10 miles of driving.



Here are a couple pictures of the new brakes on the car.






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