Brakes 66 I-6 4 Lug To 5 Lug Drum Brakes?

[Caveman49]

I've searched this site, but really haven't found an answer to what I'm trying to do with my 66 I6 convertible.
Question is:
I want to change the 4 lug to 5 lug drum (yes I know a disk brake conversion is better), but, I have a 5 lug parts 66 stang car that I'll be removing the drums from. Question is, do I only need to remove the spindle with drum, or will I need more front suspension parts?
I'm leaving the 6 cylinder auto in the car, and changing the rearend with a stock 66 5-lug rear. Was hoping I don't have to change all the other stuff, like pitman, idler, ctr link, tie rods, etc.....
Appreciate any response from those in the know!
Thanks.

 

[dennis112]

I've searched this site, but really haven't found an answer to what I'm trying to do with my 66 I6 convertible.
Question is:
I want to change the 4 lug to 5 lug drum (yes I know a disk brake conversion is better), but, I have a 5 lug parts 66 stang car that I'll be removing the drums from. Question is, do I only need to remove the spindle with drum, or will I need more front suspension parts?
I'm leaving the 6 cylinder auto in the car, and changing the rearend with a stock 66 5-lug rear. Was hoping I don't have to change all the other stuff, like pitman, idler, ctr link, tie rods, etc.....
Appreciate any response from those in the know!
Thanks.

You will need to swap the parts you mentioned. Spindles, tie rods, center link, idler and (IIRC) the pitman arm are all unique to the V8 swap. The swap really isn't that hard to do. Remove it in as large of an assembly as you can manage. You can reuse your UCA and LCA if they are good as they are the same in both cars.

 

[Caveman49]

Thanks for the response Dennis. I was hoping I didn't have to do all that, but will get it done. The parts car has pw steering, do you know if I can use that ctr link without the pw steering? Thanks.

 

[rbohm]

actually dennis is wrong, to a point. you can swap the spindles over directly only, if you choose. if you want to use the power steering though, or ultimately swap to a V8, THEN you need to swap the rest of the steering linkage over.

 

[dennis112]

Interesting-I've always done the whole thing. Do the tie rod ends at the spindle arms use the same diameter pins?

 

[rbohm]

yep. what happens is a lot of people think that because they have to change tie rod ends when doing the granada swap, they have to do it with all spindle swaps on six cylinder cars. at worst, assuming the outer tie rod ends dont fit the V8 spindles, you only need to change the outer tie rod ends as they will swap in place of the six cylinder ones.

 

[Caveman49]

Hunh, that was my concern, just pulling the spindles with hub and all might not work on the 6 cylinder suspension. I'm just going to swap the whole spindle setup from the V8 parts car to the I6 convertible, both are 66s. I do have a 66 coupe I'll be building after I get the vert out of my workshop. It's also a 6 cylinder car, but has already been converted over to a V8 suspension with disk brakes all around, and an 8" rear.
Thanks for the feedback.

 

[horse sence]

The outer tie rod has a smaller stud through the spindle than the V8 does so V8 tie rod ends will not work on the 4 lug spindle ,if i remember correctly the spindle threaded end is also smaller than the v8,i have a set of v8 and 6 cylinder spindles here some where but i am pretty sure they are different. The pitman on the steering box has to be changed as well ,the 6 cylinder has two holes and the v8 only has one ,the holes are bigger on the v8 and they are both shapped different. If you want to use the v8 power steering you will need the power pitman arm as it is different fron standard steering

 

[horse sence]

67 -69 spindles are the same for drum 6 cylinder and V8 so those spindles do not have to be changed out ,but 65-66 spindlesare different

 

[horse sence]

May be a bit hard to tell the difference in this pic but you can see the size difference in the threaded end of the 6 cylinder,on the right, and v8 spindle on the left

The tie rod ends are a little easier to see the size difference

 

[horse sence]

Power steering pitman arm

Standard steering pitman arm

6 cylinder pitman arm

 

[Caveman49]

Wow, definitely different! I need to look at the pitman from my parts car, I'm thinking it looks like the standard one, but not sure. I know the six cylinder pitman is totally different.
I'm trying to put some 5 lug style wheels on the 6 cylinder car, thus the change over.
Thanks for the pics Jim, big help. Who do you use to load pictures, curious, cause I use photobucket and have fits with it.

 

[horse sence]

You can load images directly from your cell or computer . You may have to save them into your album if you have a cell

 

[horse sence]

At the bottom of the text window you will see upload a file ,click on that ,a window will pop up for you to chose where you want to get the image from off your device ,it will be my files or documents . Click on the one you want and your saved images will open ,choose the one or ones you want and click on it ,a window will open asking if you want thumb nail or full image ,click full image beside the single pic or insert every image as full image and wait for the pic or pics to load ,then click post reply

 

[Caveman49]

Jim, I'm gonna have to digest that a bit, I'm sure it's not that difficult, but for someone like me, I'll make it more difficult then it needs to be.

 

[Caveman49]

Hunh, it worked, cool.

 

[Caveman49]

Where the convertible is at today.