Jeep Wrangler JK brake upgrades
I’ve lifted my share of Wranglers, and slapped on big beefy tires, only to find out days later that my braking just isn’t up to snuff (and that can be a scary discovery). Those new 38 inch tires you’ve been eyeing will look great, and perform fantastic offroad, but consequently they’ll result in a hundred pounds of rolling momentum added to your Jeep, making it crazy hard to stop using stock brakes. Before you upgrading your tires, you’ll want to investigate the available Jeep Wrangler JK brake upgrades – many of them are affordable (some are over the top expensive).
My experiences with Wrangler brake upgrades
While I’ve run larger than stock tires for years now, on several different Jeeps (my current ride is a TJ with 33s), I’ve found the stock brakes appear to perform fine for smaller tires. However, when you go larger than stock it makes stopping abruptly difficult, if not completely impossible. Initially I started like many people, by upgrading the brake pads to a “performance” pad, while this alone can help, I saw much better results by upgrading the calipers, rotors, pads, even the pump and brake lines, resulting in those big tires stopping on a dime.
Be sure to plan your brake upgrade before you begin
I’ve found that by planning everything out in the beginning, I’m able to also plan the costs for my entire build, as a result I was able to avoid doing replacing pads multiple times. In conclusion, how much of a brake upgrade you’d like to do really depends on your budget – you can go from a $40 set of pads, to a $1000 full blown kit.
View our reviews of the following Jeep Wrangler JK Brake Upgrades:
