"Sleeving" A- body brake drums?

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OK, then that increases the market for them, that's a good thing.......
 
Only way to do it would be plasma-spray, and then grind/machine to stock diameter. It wouldn't be cheap.
 
Aftermarket will run a lot of X thousand pieces for distribution when the market demand is great enough. Droughts are common in parts for other brands too. I remember when a friend needed 2 axle bearings for his 63 Impala. Davis Auto Parts had the only 1 left ( showing on vendors inventory anyway ) in the USA. They did find another and ordered it in from Canada.
 
Those Centrics look a bit different but they fit/worked just fine ........
Drum6.jpg
 
65Val said:
... when all the used ones are gone (which won't be long, I suspect) what do we do then?
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I worried also when I was a newbie at this. Be patient and save your money. If really worried, buy 2 pairs of 10" drums now. Search posts here and you will see that front rotors were "not avail" and ~$100 used ~5 yrs ago, but now you can buy new for $25 and disk brakes are much rarer parts. If it really comes to it, you can replace the whole rear-end w/ a cut-down Ford 8.8 (Explorer) to get a stronger part w/ disks. Brake parts are common and should be available for decades more. Worst-case, someone will figure how to drill holes to adapt a GM part.

Parts you should worry about are: interior, dash, trim, ... I have even bought several of the now-rare ball & trunnion front drive-shaft "ball joint" (62-65) new on ebay. Don't wait until you must have it, just keep searching for those over a few years. I even found the rare aluminum 4 bbl intake for 64-65 small-block at a good price. What are hard to find are the rare desirable parts (4 spd tranny, Sure-Grip rear, ...). If happy w/ a factory slant six, much less competition.
 
As a matter of engineering curiousity, there were drums made of aluminum with steel lining. There's pictures in Fred Puhn's Brake book. IIRC this was done for several different cars including some Buicks and Corvettes. Might be interesting to look into how they were made (and if they still are).
 
BillGrissom said:
I worried also when I was a newbie at this. Be patient and save your money. If really worried, buy 2 pairs of 10" drums now. Search posts here and you will see that front rotors were "not avail" and ~$100 used ~5 yrs ago, but now you can buy new for $25 and disk brakes are much rarer parts. If it really comes to it, you can replace the whole rear-end w/ a cut-down Ford 8.8 (Explorer) to get a stronger part w/ disks. Brake parts are common and should be available for decades more. Worst-case, someone will figure how to drill holes to adapt a GM part.

Parts you should worry about are: interior, dash, trim, ... I have even bought several of the now-rare ball & trunnion front drive-shaft "ball joint" (62-65) new on ebay. Don't wait until you must have it, just keep searching for those over a few years. I even found the rare aluminum 4 bbl intake for 64-65 small-block at a good price. What are hard to find are the rare desirable parts (4 spd tranny, Sure-Grip rear, ...). If happy w/ a factory slant six, much less competition.
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Hey all...I'm not worried, nor do I need new drums at this time. It was just an idea I floated because these drums are getting hard to find. I really think if you can sleeve an engine block, aluminum at that, you should be able to sleeve a brake drum. Besides, the rear brakes only contribute approx. 25% of your overall braking force anyway.
 
65Val said:
Yes, but my point is: when all the used ones are gone (which won't be long, I suspect) what do we do then?
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Simply. Get out of the dark ages and upgrade to 5x4.5" bolt pattern.
 
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65Val said:
Don't wanna. My car's stock...and it's stayin' that way.
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So what's not stock about the 5x4.5" bolt circle?Especially since the later A's got it. That's called an upgrade. Stop bein stupid.
 
65Val said:
Hey all...I'm not worried, nor do I need new drums at this time. It was just an idea I floated because these drums are getting hard to find. I really think if you can sleeve an engine block, aluminum at that, you should be able to sleeve a brake drum. Besides, the rear brakes only contribute approx. 25% of your overall braking force anyway.
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You CAN'T do it for all of the reasons I already listed back on the first page of this thread, and to weld/re-machine again I would charge more to do that than cast a new one
from scratch, it ain't gonna happen and it's not a sound proposal........................
 
Mattax said:
As a matter of engineering curiousity, there were drums made of aluminum with steel lining. There's pictures in Fred Puhn's Brake book. IIRC this was done for several different cars including some Buicks and Corvettes. Might be interesting to look into how they were made (and if they still are).
Click to expand...


Probably about 10 years ago, or so; I investigated a company up for sale near me that relined 8 bolt Pontiac and Buick aluminum drums, they had also done some early Porsche drums. It was a patented process of removing old lineing, pressing in a new one and trueing up the wheel. For $40,00.00 I could have bought the company and process. They had also relined other iron drums; I thought of the possibility of the "Darth Vader" drums as additional items to be done, they weren't on the customer list, just figured no one had asked yet. Didn't buy it due to a poor ROI, would have taken a long time to re-coop $40,00.00 .
 
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