Rear Discs

[75stepside]

I know i've read theads here before about rear discs conversions... anyone do it? is it as simple as getting discs to fit and then calipers and making brackets for the calipers???

any info greatly appreciated.

[ElGracho]

Here's some food for thought, take it for what it's worth.

About 3 years ago I put a Stainless Steel Brakes Corp. kit on my then daily driver 84 K10. I was sick of the self adjusters in my rear drums not working and having a long pedal because of it. I spent the ~$650 for the kit. It consists of some flat 1/4" brackets, spacers, 88-98 front K10 rotors with some mickey mouse little spacers to make up the difference between the later 14mm wheel studs and the stock 7/16" studs on my K10, some Ford calipers (I still haven't figured their original application) some brake hoses and hardware.

The kit was fairly complete but I feel poorly designed and engineered. They don't include supports for the hard brake line where it attaches to the flex lines. This can lead to fatigue failure of the hard brake lines and loss of your rear brakes. If you make their recommended modification to your combination valve conncected to the outlets of your master cylinder, you remove the shuttle valve portion and would then lose all brakes on the loss of a single line. The spacers they included for the caliper brackets caused the calipers to rub the discs and when called, their 'tech support' recommeded using washers. The spacers for the wheel lugs fall out when you remove the wheels and keep the rotor from fitting tightly against the axle flanges unless you take the time to get them all lined up properly each time you put your rear wheels back on (which you MUST do). Lastly, the caliper brackets flex under cornering loads and cause a squeaking/vibration from the rear end that will scare the crap out of you each time you hear it.

I'm about to convert back to drums and hock that system on Ebay.

The 2wd application may at least get rid of the wheel lug spacers but all of the other shortcomings of at least the SSBC kit will still be there.

I'd recommed either keeping your drums (you front brakes will be doing about 80% of the braking no matter what anyhow...) or going with a better designed kit like something from Baer brakes.

[odie82]

I have see a kit offered through 911brakes.com

[mike reeh]

my 77 K25 has discs all around. I have never done 1/2 ton rear discs but if you have the full floater 3/4ton axle, its easy, cheap and IMHO very worth it. I would never go back, and will never settle for the drums ever again..

The only custom peice on my setup is the caliper bracket & an aluminum spacer for that bracket.. I found a guy on the internet (on another truck forum) that machined the brackets at work and bought a set from him.. they are VERY nice (and simple) and the whole setup works well and I love it. Aside from the bracket & spacer, you use the same rotors & calipers & pads that the front of the truck uses. There are a lot of ways to connect the calipers to the original hard brake lines, but I didnt like any of them, so I had Earls make me some custom brake lines for the rear and did away with the hard lines altogether.. (its braided steel line that goes from each caliper all the way to the pumpkin "tee")

I think that kit quality is crucial if you're going to go with a complete kit. I wouldnt try to do it the cheapest way possible. Oh and your best resource is definately the internet.. I would check out google and search some other truck forums. you WILL find what you're looking for.

mike

[1FaastC10]

i too have disc brakes for my FF, but i bought my brackets through www.sky-manufacturing.com .

[drink2mny]

Just curious what you have found..

What type of rearend do you have??

Just an option you could check Blackbird's (check signature) out for prices.