I am very much a noob when it comes to the conversation of disc brake conversions. I have been seeing a lot of people talking about getting a CPP 4 wheel disc conversion then others say Kor3....go with the Summit one but now I am looking at people saying use an LS1 or C5 setup? What exactly are they talking about? what is an LS1 brake kit? I definitely need to do the conversion but don't know where to begin.

Thanks in advance for all the help.

A C5 brake set up is the short term for a C5 Corvette. An LS1 brake set up is short term for a 98-02 Camaro or Firebird (F body) with an LS1 motor. Not all F bodies came with rear disc, only the LS1 powered cars. The C5 rotors are about 13" diameter and you WILL need at least a 17" rim for them to fit (might need a wheel spacer as well). An 18" rim would be better for clearance of the caliper. An LS1 rotor is 12" in diameter and will fit most 17" rims.

There are three basic options when it comes to disc brake packages:

1) Do it yourself retrofitting of late model brakes usually with aftermarket brackets. Kore3 would be a good example of this - they sell brackets to adapt the 12.8" front and 12" rear C5/C6 Corvette brakes to most older GM vehicles. In this case you either buy new GM calipers and rotors to fit to their brackets or you pick up some used ones. There are also brackets available to fit 70's GM front calipers and 11" rotors to your stock drum spindles as well as brackets to fit some of the early rear disc packages to your stock axle (using 80's cadillac or T-bird calipers for instance). As far as the rear disc brakes go, all rear wheel drive midsize GM passenger cars used the same axle flange pattern so just about any brake package off of these cars will retrofit to your stock rear axle. The most important of these are '98-'02 LS1 F-body (12"), '98+ S10 (11.6"), '93-'97 LT1 F-body (11.5"). Check out the following links for some good tips:

http://www.geocities.com/diels12000/
http://www.chevelles.com/forums/showthread.php?t=115940&highlight=cheap+disc+brake

2) Aftermarket kits that simple provide late model retrofits in one complete package. CPP, Master Power, Summit, Touring Classics are all good examples of this. They are selling primarily convenience since they include complete instructions and have all of the parts provided, but you can save A LOT of money if you do it yourself as mentioned in 1). Luckily, these vendors have caught on that hot rodders have learned how to do it themselves and they have lowered their prices or added upgrades to their kits. I remember when stock style front disc packages cost about $900 - now you can do it yourself with equal quality components for about half that. BTW, I am running a complete C5 package for less than the cost of most aftermarket 15" front disc packages just by purchasing Kore3 brackets and used calipers and rotors (only 800 miles of use, though).

3) Genuine aftermarket brake packages with all original components. Wilwood is the main player in this category. They provide their own calipers and rotors. The stuff is top quality race-type stuff, but you'll pay for it. Baer is kind of a hybrid in this category. They sell primarily C4 with some C5 corvette stuff, but it is all make to their standards, which generally exceeds GM standards by a large margin so it is basically GM quality engineering with race quality parts. Baer has the advantage in that all of their calipers use off the shelf pads and in many cases can work with off the shelf rotors (although they would be a big step down from the Baer rotors).

The biggest determining factor when upgrading your brakes is what size wheel you will run. I had 14" wheel when I started and so I put 15" brakes on it, but by the time I actually finished building the car, I had switched to 17" wheels. I ended up selling my 15" brakes for a huge hit and going with the C5 package. If you ever plan on being one of those people that wants big wheels and big brakes, then the first thing you should do is get the wheels you really want. If you don't think you'll care about your brake size, then just get a set that'll fit your wheels along with some top quality pads (good pads and rotors are the biggest determining factor in the performance of your disc brake system - much more than brand or size). The general rule of thumb is that your wheel need to be 4" bigger than your rotors although there are some exceptions. The second consideration is hub to spoke clearance. C5 brakes while excellent performers and very reasonably priced have very shallow rotors so your calipers end up hitting the spokes of most wheels. For instance, my 17" Cragar SSs and AE Torque thrust IIs have 5/8" hub to spoke clearance, but my C5 calipers need 7/8". The simple fix for this is to use 1/4 wheel spacers.

If you do some research on this subject, you will find tons of info. The Napa site has great tech info for all of the rotors they sell so can get dimensional info that helps for determining fit on retro fit applications.

I am nowhere near a brake expert like some of the boys on this forum, but I have researched a lot of different brake packages on the market for a buddy of mine with a big wallet and several car projects spanning about 5 decades. If you would like some help finding the right package for your car, feel free to PM me.