Brake Calipers

For the 2024-2025 Baja competition season, I designed custom brake calipers. This included designing the housing for the calipers, as well as custom brake pads and leaf springs to hold the pads in place. During the design process, my goal was to improve the spring-back and durability of the leaf springs by testing different materials and heat treating processes. 

Summary

What:

  • Apply braking force to the rotors, using hydraulics

  • Lock all four wheels during dynamic brake check

  • Two outboard calipers in the front, one inboard in the rear

  • Caliper assembly includes custom housing, brake pads and leaf springs

How:

  • Designed with SolidWorks

  • Analyzed with Ansys

  • Tested material properties of off-the-shelf leaf springs to develop correct heat treatment process for custom springs

  • Working with brake pad manufacturers to create custom brake pads

Result:

  • Expected service life increase with redesigned leaf springs

  • Improved machinability with less required tooling, standardized hardware

  • Increased FOS against failure due to high pressure

Extended Caliper_edited.jpg
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