1986 Struts with 87+ spindles and brakes?

1986LX2002 · Dec 19, 2004

My buddy gave me his old brake setup off his 88GT because he just finished his 5lug cobra brake setup. I got his old spindles and front brakes, can I use my 86 struts? or do I have to buy new ones?

Darkhorse845 · Dec 19, 2004

Buy new ones.

Daggar · Dec 19, 2004

You'll need the 87 - 93 struts for those spindles.

fordnatic · Dec 19, 2004

your struts will work... all 85-93 5.0 stangs ran the same strut. However if they are in question you should change them while you have the front end torn down that far anyhow. my 2 cents

Daggar · Dec 19, 2004

fordnatic said:
your struts will work... all 85-93 5.0 stangs ran the same strut. However if they are in question you should change them while you have the front end torn down that far anyhow. my 2 cents

This is incorrect. Example: Gabriel ultra Strust for an 86 is Part # G56504 and for a 87 is G55551. If you look at sites that do brake upgrades you will see that the majority of them offer front brake upgrades for 87-93 and not the 85-86. The struts and much of the hardware on 85-86 Stanges must be changed over to 87-93 in order to use those upgrades. the spindles you have are 87-93 and you must change the strut and hardware in order to get them to fit.

Edit: Don't forget... The 86s came with the same brakes as the 4cyl. They didn't up the meat for the braking system until the following year.

1986LX2002 · Dec 19, 2004

Man reason i was asking is because i really want to install the 2000 cobra R struts from Maximum Motorsports, but I dont have that kind of cash considering my car was broken into and they messed up the column pretty bad. I'll just look into some cheap ones for temp use. Thanks guys for the info.

89MustangGX · Dec 19, 2004

I believe you can in fact use your old struts, but you will need washers or steel spacer plates to make up the difference in width at the bottom. The top should be the same. Some struts actually come with these as they're designed to be used for the different years.

If this is confusing, I have a set of spacer plates off a pair of struts I took off, I can take pics.

BlackFox5.0 · Dec 19, 2004

I think they are the same. My brother put my old spindles on his 4cyl. He used his old struts too. I think I remember us having to put in washers at the mounting point because the 4cyl strut was a bit to wide at the mounting point.

You car has the same brakes as an '87-'93 4cyl...

rubberneck · Dec 19, 2004

89MustangGX said:
I believe you can in fact use your old struts, but you will need washers or steel spacer plates to make up the difference in width at the bottom. The top should be the same. Some struts actually come with these as they're designed to be used for the different years.

If this is confusing, I have a set of spacer plates off a pair of struts I took off, I can take pics.

this is correct. the mounting point on the spindle is not as thick on the gt brakes as it is on the smaller ones. my lakewood 90/10's came with spacers just for that reason.

1986LX2002 · Dec 19, 2004

I have Koni red adjustables, so where do you put the washers/spacers?

BlackFox5.0 · Dec 19, 2004

Where the strut makes contact with the spindle.....you need washers so the bolts don't crush the strut.

1986LX2002 said:
I have Koni red adjustables, so where do you put the washers/spacers?

rubberneck · Dec 19, 2004

BlackFox5.0 said:
Where the strut makes contact with the spindle.....you need washers so the bolts don't crush the strut.

89MustangGX · Dec 19, 2004

BlackFox5.0 said:
Where the strut makes contact with the spindle.....you need washers so the bolts don't crush the strut.

Exactly. I don't see why washers wouldn't work -- but some do actually come with steel plates. I think they're 1/8" thick or so.

1986LX2002 · Dec 19, 2004

Cool thanks guys!

Matts89LX5.0 · Dec 20, 2004

you can use them, u have to grind the hole a little bit to get the spindles and strut to come together...i did it once before

1986 Struts with 87+ spindles and brakes?

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