Old Chevy straight axle/spindles question

[solidnoise]

I got a straight axle from a 50 chevy pu. What i want to do is replace the brakes and a hardware kit and wheel cyl. But I want to use car drums from the same year because they are five lug drums, My question is are the spindles the same from the car to the truck?

 

[RPM]

The spindles are the same dimension on the truck and the car, the difference is in the king pin angle and the bolt pattern of the backing plate. What you are wanting to do should work.

We use the same disc brake adapters and kits on both spindles.

 

[R Pope]

It's a common, easy swap, but I don't recall if you need different bearings and seals. I seem to think you use the car outer bearings and the truck inners, but it's been thirty years, the brain cells are no longer trustworthy!

 

[solidnoise]

Thanks GUY's for your input. We are still toying with the idea of using the drum brakes.

RPM...We were told by a local machine shop that since the truck spindle were bigger we wouldn't be able to convert to disc unless we switched to car spindles. Thank you for the information.


I've only found one place online that has the hardware kit for drum brakes and that is http://www.kanter.com ...We've gone to the local brake shop here and they laughed at us and told us to go to autozone which we did, and they told us to go to the brake shop....WTH.... I ask if I could look at there old parts books to see if I could cross the kit to something else and they said they throw the old part books away because no has that OLD JUNK anymore....That guy Pi$$ed me off.

 

[bowatjr6969]

The local machine shop you spoke of is correct!! BUT!! I took my 1950 chevy 8 bolt 3/4 ton spindles and turned them down to do the swap. See I am a tight A$$ and if I can do the work myself I will versus spending $200.00+ for the kit. I found that a 1980 Monte Carlo outer wheel bearing was the same I.D. as my 3/4 ton bearing. So I chucked up the spindles in my lathe at work and turned the inners to the right O.D. for the inner bearings. I also had to make the bearing spacer which was nothing really. If you look at the kit in Speedway Motors they give you a price for turning your spindles if you choose. Mine turned out Damn fine and for only $84.00 after I bought the rotors bearings seals and bearing cap from O'Reilly Auto. I made my own caliper bracket and rebuilt some old Monte Carlo calipers I had laying around from my racing days.
No I didn't have to pay a machine shop to do the work but it CAN be done.LOL

Good Luck on your build!!

 

[sammy]

crosing breeds

if you will ask for 65 ford mustang wheel cylenders , you will find that they are demensionaly the same as the old chevy. think I had to switch sides to get the coreect angle for the matching 65 mustang brake hoses, but iv got less than a 1oo.oo in the whole front of mine. with verry little fabricating.. Sammy