having problems keeping my chevy's rear sealed up . another axle seal is leaking and the pinion seal is flinging oil to. I have a 59 ford 9" rear laying around and was thinking either, rebuild this one and weld on the neccessary mounts, get a lincoln 9" and have the disc brakes and everything just basically install the brackets and install without rebuilding or just buy the welded up 9" to fit my wagon and swap the guts from the 9" i have. your opinions are welcomed
sorry forgot to ask if i go the route of the 9" from a later model any suggestions as to which car to pull it from
The disc brakes on a lincoln 9" are very expensive to rebuild, you can almost buy a wildwood kit for the price of replacing the lincoln parts I don't know what year your wagon is, but there are many 9" charts on the web to verify the length. 9" rears have a short and long axle, you may be able to narrow a truck housing to use a short axle on the "long" side by cutting the welds at the center section, shortening the axle tube, pressng the axle tube back in and rewelding, a jig is recommended
Unless you change the bolt pattern, the ford rearend will be 5 x 4.5 (most passenger car Fords) or 5x5 (full size Lincolns) or 5 x 5.5 (most 2wd trucks). Which none of them match your front 5 x 4.75 pattern. Several aftermarket suppliers make a bolt-in 9-inch rear assy for your 59 wagon. That would be the easiest solution and you can spec whatever brakes you want. You could find a junkyard rear and weld on the brackets needed, less cost and lot more work. Any 9-inch swap is going to be a lot more work than just fixing your orig rear in the car now. BTW, drum brakes on rear work just fine unless you plan on some serious track racing.
Make sure your vent tube on the Chevy is clear, when it gets warm the pressure has to go some where. If the vent is clogged,it will push oil through the seals. The 59 ford car rear had odd brakes, and drums that are nearly impossible to find. The truck 59 ford drums you can buy, but they are narrow shoes and 5.5 pattern only. 60-61 went to a WAR third memeber and was quite a bit stronger, 28 spline ran aprox. up to '73. Then you started to see lots more 31 spline axles in trucks after 73.
The W.A.R. case is actually one to avoid if you are looking for a performance unit,but they work just fine in moderate hp applications. Also,don't fall into the trap of getting talked into a rear out of a big full size Lincoln.They look like a heavy duty 9",but you can't buy any gears or performance parts for them,and they are geared incredibly tall...something like a 2.41 or something crazy like that. Scott Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Sometimes there is a worn area in the axel where the seal contacts. I think you can get a seal area repair sleeve from the auto parts to slip over the axel and is a press fit.
My 2c. Take what you have and modify it to bolt in the Chevy, and buy ALL new parts to go in it and have fun. Don't get too hung up on high performance or disc brakes if you don't need it.
Stay away from Lincoln Versailles rear ends as no parts are available for them and you must get all the disc brake and emergency brake components otherwise the rear brakes won't adjust properly. Plus, they are all highway gears and it would cost you a fortune to rebuild. Highly overrated.
the rear in the car now was rebuilt about 3 yrs ago. this is the 2nd time for a leaking axle seal and the axle's are brand new . i will have to look into the breather issue and see if that is the cause
The 8.8 rears are excellent. The ones with disc brakes are 59 1/2 in. wide WMS to WMS. I think the pinion offset is about 2 in. but that can be remedied. Here's an excellent article I saved from years ago. Don't know where it's from. Explorer 8.8 Rears First of all the 8.8 from under an Explorer is a tough over-built unit. Not quite as tough as the 9" but said to be stouter than the 8". 31 spline axles and higher number R&P ratios make them attractive to those adding OD transmissions to their machines. The axle tubes on the 8.8 are 3.25" in diameter so you want to salvage the u-bolts and lower mount plates as well as the rear universal flange mount plate from the donor vehicle. Most over-the-counter U-bolts are 3" max and custom u-bolts can get pricey. Also, the emergency brake setup combines both cables into a single cable which would make adapting it to the stock AD E-brake mechanism much simpler. Also keep the rear u-joint attachment bolts....they're metric and $2.00 each from the dealers!! The bolt pattern on an 8.8 is 5 on 4.5.....not the usual GM 5 on 4.75. The pre-95 diffs are 10" drums and the post-94's are discs. The axle code is on a sticker on the drivers door post: #44 is a non-locker 3.73 #45 is a non-locker 3.55 D4 and D5 are 3.73 with traction lock. I was pleasantly surprised at the number of diffs, both drum and discs in our local yards. You didn't have to crawl under the vehicle to hunt for a tag to ID the ratio, and that the biggest surprise was that my yard charged me a flat $100.00 for the 3.73 drum Trac-lok. I could have had a disc setup for the same money. The current lists of donor diffs has you scrounging for 35-50 year old diffs that are at least going to need all new seals and brakes if not bearings and gear sets, if you can find one!!!!. It might be wise to consider taking a closer look at the 8.8 and keeping a little of that extra jingle in your own pocket.
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