yes its the e parking brake caliper. Supercars have always used a two caliper system as do motorcycles with E-parking brakes. Some of the cars we've seen with electronic parking brakes hide the second caliper because they use a drum/disc setup... its also possible we just notice it as often because were not always looking for it...

 

check it out, this F-Type was loitering in my parking garage and I snapped a few pics of the e-parking calliper...

 

Thanks. There must be a good reason for it, but it escapes me. Might simply have to do with multi-piston calipers. I'm familiar with the drum-in-hat setups... and my $20,000 Pontiac Solstice can manage an e-brake and hydraulic caliper all in one, but the rears are single pot.

 

off the top of my head I would imagine that the difference could be that the e-brake is no longer mechanical, therefore isn't compatible with hydraulic brakes. I'm not sure, but my thinking is that the electronic e brake is essentialy brake by wire... the comand is sent to module, which then executes...

Other then that I've got nothing ahaha

 

I assume that it is in replacement of another type of brake, a drum brake or something else. Given the focus on weight saving I am guessing these brakes are either way better than other options, or not weighing much more at all actually.

 

No...

This has nothing to do with weight saving, nor are we looking at a NEW type of brake. Its a simple rear wheel disc featuring an electronic parking brake. For the most part ANYTHING using a purely electrical parking brake will have a second caliper. just like once upon a time a mechanical cable used to run back there for when you pulled the handle up, now there just needs to be a second caliper for when you press that parking brake button... it cant rely on hydraulic pressure like your car does when you're braking it, nor can it rely on the simple mechanical cable...

 

I just hope people actually use it often enough or as much as they should be for the sake of the system staying in good standing. Plus doesn't avoiding use of the parking brake put stress on the transmission that down the road leads to problems?

 

Hi Rollin_in_Clover,

I was wondering if you could help; is the photo below of your car? Are the brake calipers, the optional anodized black finish?
If so, how black (or grey) do they look in real life?

Cheers,
Tilum

 

It has nothing to do with the fact that the parking brake is electric. It has to do with the fact that it has multiple piston rear calipers.

 

There must be some benefit worthy of the unsprung weight increase.

 

It's simply a technical requirement.

If you have a single piston floating caliper, it's easy to integrate the parking brake. You add helical grooves so that when you rotate the piston it also moves axially, and rotate the piston by pulling on a lever with a steel cable, or by integrating an electric motor in the caliper.

If you have a multiple piston fixed caliper, that is no longer feasible. Which means you have to add a separate braking mechanism, either a drum-in-hat or an additional single piston caliper.