disc brake conversion
- Thread starter hairy72
- Start date
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grumpuscreature
Resident Curmudgeon
If you can live with Blowtie parts on your car, scarebird.com has a really affordable kit. I'd rather have Mopar drums than GM discs. Just my $.02.
C130 Chief
Mechanical Genius
And the classic write-up...
http://www.moparaction.com/Tech/archive/disc-main.html
http://www.moparaction.com/Tech/archive/disc-main.html
I don't know all the in's and outs of a conversion. That article will set you up staright.
Donor cars! Look for the junk bodies and no engine cars if you can.
Theres also Later B body options. The '78 Cordoba I ripped apart had the 11-3/4 discs. You'll want the caliper bracket and calipers and rotors forsure. I do beleve the spindles are needed over the drum cars, but if you gad discs, I think you can skip it.
Donor cars! Look for the junk bodies and no engine cars if you can.
Theres also Later B body options. The '78 Cordoba I ripped apart had the 11-3/4 discs. You'll want the caliper bracket and calipers and rotors forsure. I do beleve the spindles are needed over the drum cars, but if you gad discs, I think you can skip it.
First off - What year car/model are you converting.
Post that up and I can tell you at a minimum what you need.
The mopar action article is an excellent reference
Post that up and I can tell you at a minimum what you need.
The mopar action article is an excellent reference
Follow the mopar action article. Only additional parts you will need are the 73+ A-body upper control arms.
You do realize that you will need new wheels to do the swap. Going from 5 on 4" to 5 on 4.5" bolt pattern. The only other deal you can do is willwoods ($$) which are drilled for both patterns.
You do realize that you will need new wheels to do the swap. Going from 5 on 4" to 5 on 4.5" bolt pattern. The only other deal you can do is willwoods ($$) which are drilled for both patterns.
71DartGuy
Well-Known Member
You may or may not need lower ball joints. I'm pretty sure you will need the uppers though. I am doing the same swap on my 71 dart and the donor parts came from a 73 dart, which had bigger ball joints top and bottom.
Lower ball joints are the same size, early or late.
While the lower ball joints are the same you'll discover they are nearly impossible to seperate from the steering knuckle without distroying the dust boots. scarebird conversion is probably the easiest and least expensive route to disc brakes.
If the front end needs a complete rebuild anyway, use the later model mopar stuff from a donor car. Get power booster, perportion valve , the works.
If the front end needs a complete rebuild anyway, use the later model mopar stuff from a donor car. Get power booster, perportion valve , the works.
grumpuscreature
Resident Curmudgeon
Does your Duster have 9" or 10" front drums? Called scarebird to get the lowdown on installation. Basically, you unbolt the drum backing plates and bolt the scarebird caliper bracket in it's place. You must support the lower control arm (jackstands work nicely with the weight of the car on them) because you are unbolting the lower ball joint bolts to do this. The only hard part is having the hubs pressed out of your drums for re-use. I have a pair of 9" drum hubs I got off eBay. That's how close I came to buying this kit. Just couldn't force myself to put GM parts on a Mopar.
uke:You can get pics at scarebird.com.
grumpuscreature
Resident Curmudgeon
Does your Duster have 9" or 10" front drums? Called scarebird to get the lowdown on installation. Basically, you unbolt the drum backing plates and bolt the scarebird caliper bracket in it's place. You must support the lower control arm (jackstands work nicely with the weight of the car on them) because you are unbolting the lower ball joint bolts to do this. The only hard part is having the hubs pressed out of your drums for re-use. I have a pair of 9" drum hubs I got off eBay. That's how close I came to buying this kit. Just couldn't force myself to put GM parts on a Mopar.
uke:
pauly v.100
Well-Known Member
C130 Chief
Mechanical Genius
One drawback to the Scarebird kit when replacing 9" drums is the retention of the smaller lower ball joint. This was never regarded as being a particularly robust setup, especially considering the small bolts holding it joint to the spindle.
If you are still thinking about doing the conversion.
I have both a big bolt and small bolt set up available.
I'll shoot you a PM.
I have both a big bolt and small bolt set up available.
I'll shoot you a PM.
Nothing about that front suspension is considered robust. They doubled up the idler arm support on later K frames along with other changes. An owner really needs to decide what he wants, better, stronger, (meaning complete front end rebuild using donor parts), or just a good straight line stop from disc brakes (scarebird). Good luck
I did this conversion on my barracuda over the summer. Knock the GM parts all you want to but the car stops hard. A big difference over the drums that I did have. Since I already have a nice set of 5 on 4 cragars, the bigger bolt pattern was out of the question. I didn't put the factory small bolt set up on there b/c parts are getting difficult to find and rather expensive when you do find them. I did the whole conversion for $600 dollars. Just a bit of machining involved here and there. I chronicled my whole swap on moparts.com. Can't post the link b/c of restrictions while I'm at work but you can search "preliminary scarebird results" and go to the link. or you can pm me and I will be happy to help.
65s
Well-Known Member
For $600 you should be able to aquire small bolt pattern Kelsey Hayes original '66-72 discs and everything just bolts right one, no machining, grinding or customizing like the Scarebird kit. Too many caveats with that Scarebird...they have the most appropriate name I must say!
The $600 included the scarebird adapters and shipping, rotors, loaded calipers, 2 rubber brake hoses, prop valve, dual circuit master cylinder for disc brakes, new metal brake lines coming off of the master cylinder, wheel studs, brake fluid, a tubing bender, a double flare kit and that goo you put on brake pads to keep them from squeeking. It was the total cost of doing the conversion not just the parts. For the scarebird brackets and disc brake parts it was under $300. You would have to be one lucky person to find a working kelsey hayes, small bolt disc set-up for that price. They sell corroded junk on ebay for that price. There is nothing at all scary about the scarebird stuff. It works fine.
Hey I need some of those!
I have a '72 Demon that currently has SBP Drums. Strange thing is though, for some reason it has the front sway bar (thought they only came with the performance package, i.e discs and BBP).
Can you help me?...Dartlover
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