87 88 thunderbird rear in a mustang
- Thread starter mercurycapri
- Start date
maxine-70
20+ Year Stangneter 
yes but plan on your rear wheels sticking out 3/4" extra per side. if youve got clearance and access to a cheap rearend from a turbocoupe, go for it. its pretty much the same thing used in the 93 cobra
Been there and done that! With success! 
Do the 87-88 T-Bird Turbo Coupe rear end swap!
Auto trans 87-88 Tbird Turbo Coupes come with 3.73 gears and manual Turbo Coupes come with 3.55 gears. Cost is $125-$300 for the rear axle. Add another $100-$200 or so to complete the brake upgrade.
I choose 3.55 since I do more highway driving. Both ratios have 10” disk brakes with vented rotors as standard equipment.
It takes 2 guys the first day to get the old rear end out and the new one bolted in place. It takes 1 guy another whole day to do the brakes.
You will need a several sets of fittings, I recommend that you get them from Matt90GT's website, http://www.svo73mm.cjb.net/. Read Matt's instructions thoroughly, everything you need to know about the brakes is all there. You need to be patient and follow all the internal links, and there are many of them. You will need 2 fittings in the rear to adapt your old brake tubing to the TC disk brakes. The fittings go between the steel tube and the caliper brake hose. You will need another set of fittings to make a 2 port to 3 port adapter. To make life simpler, just buy the kits from Matt. You could piece them together, but it's not worth the time unless you work at an auto parts store with all the fittings ever made.
You will need to drill the quad shock mounting holes 2” below the holes drilled for the Turbo Coupe mounting points. The bolts are metric, so don’t loose them or the nuts. A 15/32” drill should be about the right size unless you have access to metric sized drill bits. Going without quad shocks is not an option unless you have aftermarket parts to soak up the wheel hop.
You will need a proportioning valve, Summit has one for $40 + shipping.
You will need a kit (FMS makes the part) to gut the stock proportioning valve, Summit also has that, about $10.
You will need a new master cylinder, see Matt's site and make you choice. I used a 94-95 Mustang master cylinder. Note that rebuilt 94-95 Mustang master cylinders do not come with a reservoir. That means a trip to the junkyard and some more money spent.
Your brake pedal may be very hard and almost impossible to lock up the brakes. I had to replace the front calipers with 73 mm calipers from a 91 Lincoln Mark 7 to get the braking performance up to par.
Bleeding the brakes will require 2 people and some coordinated effort. I don’t recommend using you wife or girlfriend to pump the pedal – they get offended when you yell at them. I used a homemade power brake bleeder constructed from a garden sprayer and some fittings from Home Depot. It cost about $25 and was worth every penny. See http://forums.stangnet.com/showthread.php?p=6143048 for details and pictures.
See http://www.mustangcentral.net/tech/brake.html for help with the emergency brake. The red words link to some very useful photos on how to modify the handle. The stock setup tends to lock up and not release properly.
All in all I have been very pleased with the results.
Do the 87-88 T-Bird Turbo Coupe rear end swap!
Auto trans 87-88 Tbird Turbo Coupes come with 3.73 gears and manual Turbo Coupes come with 3.55 gears. Cost is $125-$300 for the rear axle. Add another $100-$200 or so to complete the brake upgrade.
I choose 3.55 since I do more highway driving. Both ratios have 10” disk brakes with vented rotors as standard equipment.
It takes 2 guys the first day to get the old rear end out and the new one bolted in place. It takes 1 guy another whole day to do the brakes.
You will need a several sets of fittings, I recommend that you get them from Matt90GT's website, http://www.svo73mm.cjb.net/. Read Matt's instructions thoroughly, everything you need to know about the brakes is all there. You need to be patient and follow all the internal links, and there are many of them. You will need 2 fittings in the rear to adapt your old brake tubing to the TC disk brakes. The fittings go between the steel tube and the caliper brake hose. You will need another set of fittings to make a 2 port to 3 port adapter. To make life simpler, just buy the kits from Matt. You could piece them together, but it's not worth the time unless you work at an auto parts store with all the fittings ever made.
You will need to drill the quad shock mounting holes 2” below the holes drilled for the Turbo Coupe mounting points. The bolts are metric, so don’t loose them or the nuts. A 15/32” drill should be about the right size unless you have access to metric sized drill bits. Going without quad shocks is not an option unless you have aftermarket parts to soak up the wheel hop.
You will need a proportioning valve, Summit has one for $40 + shipping.
You will need a kit (FMS makes the part) to gut the stock proportioning valve, Summit also has that, about $10.
You will need a new master cylinder, see Matt's site and make you choice. I used a 94-95 Mustang master cylinder. Note that rebuilt 94-95 Mustang master cylinders do not come with a reservoir. That means a trip to the junkyard and some more money spent.
Your brake pedal may be very hard and almost impossible to lock up the brakes. I had to replace the front calipers with 73 mm calipers from a 91 Lincoln Mark 7 to get the braking performance up to par.
Bleeding the brakes will require 2 people and some coordinated effort. I don’t recommend using you wife or girlfriend to pump the pedal – they get offended when you yell at them. I used a homemade power brake bleeder constructed from a garden sprayer and some fittings from Home Depot. It cost about $25 and was worth every penny. See http://forums.stangnet.com/showthread.php?p=6143048 for details and pictures.
See http://www.mustangcentral.net/tech/brake.html for help with the emergency brake. The red words link to some very useful photos on how to modify the handle. The stock setup tends to lock up and not release properly.
All in all I have been very pleased with the results.
BLOWN 5.0 FOX
Member
I did it- I like it , except I am running 255s with minor rubbing issues .... crap. Currently researching backspacing techniques to run wider drag radials for the track. (any hints?)
stangbear427
Active Member
Where is the rubbing? Inside, outside, or on the quad shocks? What are you using for springs? You should be able to run a 255 tire without rubbing, especially with the extra 3/4" of clearance that rear gives you.
BLOWN 5.0 FOX
Member
well obviously it would be rubbing on the outside. I would like to find a 4 lug rim that would bring the center of the wheel inward so I can run 275 deag radials!!!
stangbear427
Active Member
Why would it obviously be rubbing on the outside? If it is then either the car is too low, or you simply need to use a panhard- something every Mustang should have had from the factory anyway. As everyone knows, the '93 Cobra has the turbo coupe rear, and I had no issues using 255 DR's on pony rims on it without a panhard. Many people are using 275's with no issues.
As for the four lug wheels with the correct offset, OEM Cobra ones will work perfectly. They will not work on the front however, unless you use Cobra rotors to correct the offset for the front.
As for the four lug wheels with the correct offset, OEM Cobra ones will work perfectly. They will not work on the front however, unless you use Cobra rotors to correct the offset for the front.
93 LX
Founding Member
I have this mod on my 82 Capri. I am using Turbo T-Bird rims and 245s rub bad. I will be converting to 5 lug using a set of 96 Spindles I have laying around and a trip to the bone yrd to get Ranger axles. I will buy the brackets mentioned on Matts page to move the wheels back to the stock location. I will be geetting new MPV rotors with the spacer as Jrichker told me in a prior post. I have the 737 version and with the correct speedo gear things are fine. I will admit that freeway driving is slower, 60 for the most part but there is nothing like hammering the throttle and for a change getting the jump on the dude next to me! As for emergency brake cables I used the cables mMatt suggests from his site. PArt numbers are there. When I convert to 5 lug my 4 lug rear disks will go to my 93 stang where e-brake cables are a bit different.
Late
Allen
Here is somthing to look at about wheels.
http://www.ponyr.com/
Late
Allen
Here is somthing to look at about wheels.
http://www.ponyr.com/
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