sbi

Greetings everyone.

Long time Honda (Accord) owner (previously 2002 Special Edition and currently two in our household - 2005 and 2013, both EX) and my daughter is now looking to buy her first car and she considers the Civic LX and the Elantra. I tried to convince her to at least check the Corolla as well and when I looked at the Corolla's specs I saw - to my shocking surprise, I have to say - that the lower trims come with drum brakes
OK, scrap the Corolla .
Looked at the Civic LX specs and guess what - drum brakes.
I'll admit - I didn't think drum brakes are still in use today on passenger cars. Can't even tell you when was the last time I saw drum brakes on cars.

Anyone here drives LX with drum brakes (after driving another car with 4XDisc brakes) and can share their experience? Any difference in braking, in pedal feel, was it even a factor when you purchased/leased your drum-equipped car?
Don't get me wrong, I know the car is safe and the brakes will work...it's just an old fashioned stigma that I have about it and as I said - I honestly didn't think they still put them on passengers' cars.

Thanks in advance.

GolNat

iTrader: (7)

They are cheap and last a long time.

If you think about the audience that Honda attracts with the standard Civic; teenagers, old people and people who just want a reliable car to get them from a to b then drums are a perfect option.

My wife's Mazda 3 has rear disk and I guess it feels better then my car but it's a 2015. It should feel better then my 01 civic (it's a Mazda too and they are great at driving dynamics).

jordan1794

Should be drums only on the rear wheels.

Being such a light car, and the fact that weight shifts to the front when breaking, I don't imagine rear discs make THAT much of a difference. Particularly at city speeds.

My 2006 has rear drums and can go from 105 mph to a stop in 8 seconds
(And around 600 feet)
60 to 0 is 4-5 seconds, not sure the distance though.
(Maybe 300-400 feet?)

I doubt drum brakes will be the difference between an accident or not...or rather, other factors (such as a distracted driver, be it your daughter or another person) would be far more likely to contribute to a crash.

I'm not saying this to convince you that it's safe, as you mentioned you already know that...just pointing out the reasoning...why add a bunch of cost to only make the car only marginally safer?
LX model is the budget model. (But you probably already know that)

ezone

They are all over the place whether you noticed it or not.
IMO, not as common as they used to be, but still not rare.


They are cheap, they are reliable, and they last a damn long time.


IMO The best thing about Hondas drum brakes is:
You might never have to buy a rear brake job! (if your mechanic is anything like me)
They seriously last that long.
On most of the Hondas with rear drum brakes I service, the front brake job to rear brake job ratio is probably 5:1 if not higher.


The worst thing about Hondas drum brakes is they just don't look all that cool when you put on big wheels.

My (kinda dirty) 12 LX right after I put 18" Accord wheels on:


I might drive 200 different cars in a month, not a single one scares me.
They all feel pretty darn similar to me, I usually can't tell any difference without looking to see what the car has under it.



Guess which car will NOT have decent resale value......
She needs to consider that in her decision.



LOL! I grew up with 4 wheel drum brakes...... I cut my teeth on single circuit brake systems..... Having a brake line blow out on one of those can turn your shorts brown.

Poopies

iTrader: (4)

I'm finishing up my rear disc conversion today. I'll let you know how it feels compared to stock.

sbi

Thank you all. My daughter ended up leasing an EX instead of LX, the monthly payment was just $20 more per month.

@Poopies - learned something new, didn't know you can convert drums to disks, and I consider my general and technical knowledge above average , I guess you learn something new every day.

Thanks again.

marteam

Using drum brakes is pretty safe, and they are being used on autocross sometimes. Unless you do road racing, disks are better.

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

Just to add a bit to the drum -> disc conversion. I converted my rear drums to discs. I didn't upgrade the proportioning valve, so I noticed almost no difference other than ease of changing them out. Apparently, at least on the 01-05's, if you swap the proportioning valve, you feel a difference.

Poopies

iTrader: (4)

Hnoob

Do you have any links or part numbers for the kit for that?

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

https://www.civicforums.com/forums/4...elled-out.html

Used all OEM equipment. Rear knuckle assemblies from a 2002 civic si hatch (sir if you're in canada), plus RSX (or 1.7el if you're in canada) e-brake cables

sdaidoji

iTrader: (1)

kit?

Yeah, like Josh would say, Philippine style

Mad Dog Tannen

You should have changed the proportioning valve, the original makes the rears engage first because drums have a longer distance to travel before they reach the friction point. Proportioning valves for combination brakes are quite different than 4 wheel disk valves.

I think your rears should be engaging earlier than your fronts as it is right now.

Poopies

iTrader: (4)

Your best bet is to find one in a scrap yard, as buying new parts would be prohibitively expensive. I was lucky and GolNat had one for sale when I was looking. If you go the scrapyard route, you can save yourself an additional $30-$40 if you take the proportioning valve off the scrapped car too (I got a new one for an '03 Si). Just keep in mind that you might have to change out the hub/bearings like I did, depending on how long the things have been sitting. It was a lot of work since I had never done it before, so make sure you have a weekend free. You just might need it.

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

I personally paid $400 for rear knuckle assemblies from an EP3 forum (I think it was ephatch.com) and another $100 for RSX e-brake cables ftom clubRSX. From there, it took about 3-4 hours to remove my old knuckle assemblies, reinstall the new stuff, and bleed the crap out of the brakes.

You're probably right, but in the... 7 years I've had them, I've noticed no ill effects.

Mad Dog Tannen

If anything, the rear would feel "washy" during hard braking, like it wants to slide sideways? If you don't drive hard, you may not notice. The rears might wear faster also.

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

Front still wear faster. No wanting to fishtail while hard braking.

Not saying you're wrong. Just providing personal experience with the swap for any member interested in doing one themselves

Poopies

iTrader: (4)

Hmm... I thought the non-Si valve just put more pressure toward the front brakes than the rears. Like, my old one was 70/30 (70% front, 30% rear) and my current one after the swap is 60/40 (60% front, 40% rear) to take advantage of the better system.

Mad Dog Tannen

Possibly, but disk brakes have less gap between the friction surfaces than drums do. So it takes shoes longer to touch a drum than it does pad to touch a rotor. So on combination brakes, the valve starts the rears first to compensate and engage all 4 at the same time. All cars are a little different, but prop. valves should be quite different on a combination setup. vs 4 wheel disks.

sdaidoji

iTrader: (1)

There's another factor if you have ABS and you are really hard braking. (Will not matter if you are not in the threshold of sliding a tire, I mean).

The ABS will regulate the pressure and keep rears higher. So, for emergency braking, the rear disks will help.

ezone

For laughs and I was bored on my lunch break

05 Civic (random choice) all using rear drum brakes, I found 5 different versions in the parts catalog:

proportioning valve #
DX 46210-S5A-912
LX 46210-S5A-922
GX 46210-S5A-942
EX w/ABS 46210-S5A-812
GX w/ABS, no prop valve shown at all
(Coupe and sedan versions show identical part numbers where applicable.)

So what's so different in the cars that they require different prop valves?? Weight? LX can't be all that much heavier than DX...

I can understand GX has a heavy CNG fuel cylinder in the trunk, I'll give you that one being different, but what about the rest?
No I didn't find any specs on the differences.