searched many threads. I have 90 fin Buick drums, MT backing plates, Walden hubs, 37-41 spindles. Couple of issues...when I mount the backing plate, (and I modified spindle clear offset), set the inside bearing and mount the hub/drum assem. the drum shoe radius hits the backing plate.(pic 1) I know it would have been necessary to trim a bit, but it does not allow the hub to seat on the inside bearing by 7/16" I would have to remove a total of 7/16" between the drum and backing plate surfaces. Seems excessive. Potential issue number 2 is when seating the drum/hub assembly without the backing plate so it seats all the way against the inside bearing, the drum only clears the steering rod, I have cross steering, by 1/16"(pic 2) at the most. seems a little close. I can space the inside bearing a bit but not real excited about that idea. Any suggestions or anyone run into this? Thanks all in advance for any help!!
On the ones I have done you pretty much have to take the lip close to flush on the drum. I would guess that lip is all of 7/16". Put the drum in your lathe and start milling. You can also do it with a rotary table on a mill or talk you local parts store guy into doing it with his brake lathe. If there is clearance when the bearings are seated, the drum can't hit the steering arm. You can just heat the arm and bend it over a little if it makes you feel better.
I thought them hubs were ment to be mounted on the inside of the drum When I did mine I used 48 hubs mounted on the inside of the drums with 58 Buick backing plates but I had to make a spacer that went between the backing plates and the spindles to make it all line up
Mr. tgd61...I am honestly really sorry to see the "mess" you've ended-up with. You've got some pretty-good-sized money tied-up in "1-800-SEND GEE WHIZ BRAKE STUFF". You've got some "NAME" brand parts there. Some of you guys gotta do some homework BEFORE you spends your dollars. ALL of these "gee-whiz" parts won't necessarily work with each other, and these manufacturers and purveyors of said parts know this. Nevertheless, they obviously don't ask guys what parts they're trying to combine as a system before they "zap" your credit card and throw the parts on the UPS truck to ya. Almost seems like.........well, I don't need to go there. I've done the Buick drum / Bendix brake swap. Looked at a bunch of ways to accomplish this basic combination. I looked at the parts you're using. I have preached about the importance of doing research, and most importantly, MEASURE and UNDERSTAND that the different backing plates that folks use for these swaps mount at different inboard or outboard OFFSETS with relation to a given plane on your spindle. Also understand that the different HUBS that people use, and whether they mount the drum inside the hub flange...OR...outside the hub flange, has an excruciatingly huge effect on the range of territory, inboard OR outboard, where your drum will reside in relation to your backing plate. For instance tgd61, IF your drums were mounted on the OUTSIDE of your hub flange (not possible because of the design of THAT hub), your drum would probably clear your backing plate AND your hub would probably seat as it should. I guess I haven't given you much positive hope. Given the parts you've chosen, I'll bet ANDY will chime-in here and hopefully give you some positive advice on solving your dilemma. If you have any interest in seeing how me and a bud did my Buick drums and all the WHYS of the project, and some of the things you need to watch out for with lots of pics and explanations, get your popcorn ready and click on the link below. Good luck! DD http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=481073&highlight=buick+drum
DD, your method is clearly superior to the other ways of doing it. Great job! That being said, tgd61 machine the lip, bend the arm, you will have brakes in a few hours. Or better yet why not call Walden and see what he recomends, you already own those parts? I have done multiple sets with the wilson hubs and his backing plates that have some miles on them and they flat out work, extra holes, tack welded bolts and all. If you don't own a lathe big enough to put a Buick drum in and have to pay shop rate for DD's conversion (which is the best I have seen) it might be more that you have in you 1 800 parts.
I just copied this from the website... WALDEN HUBS BUICK DRUM TO FORD SPINDLE HUBS These hubs are direct replacements for the old iron Ford hubs. The hubs are made from 6061 T6 Billet and feature multi-lug patterns (5 ½”, 4 ¾”, 4 ½” for your favorite wheel selection. The hubs also feature screw on dust covers and are complete with bearings, races, seals, and wheel studs. All of the machine work has been done to allow you to bolt Buick drums to your Ford spindles. Since 1999 these are the original Buick drum to Ford spindle hubs. These hubs are on owner Bobby Walden’s 1946 Ford Sedan with over 133,000 trouble-free miles! Our hot rod parts are hot rod tested tough!
All is not lost. On a typical Buick drum to Ford backing plate setup, I routinely have to machine off 1/2" of the inner lip on the Buick drum to get it to clear. This is 1/16" over what you need, and should be fine. This can be done on a brake lathe, in case you can't get access to a lathe big enough to hold the drum. If you want a little more clearance, you can take a little off of the lip of the backing plate. See here: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=64647 The close-up can be seen in the 3rd. picture in the first post. Heat and bend the steering arm to clear the drum after it is all the way on. Heat it evenly, and allow it to cool very slowly. Remember kids, if it is bolt-on and go, it is NOT a hot rod.
Do not cut any brake surface when relieving for the backing plate. Just cut the aluminum. If you cut the brake surface, the shoes will hang over the edge of the drum.
The key word here is if. It will all depend on what shoes/backing plate combo is used, and where they fall on the braking surface. The braking surface on the Buick drum is quite wide. It is plausible to remove some of the brake surface from the drum, so long as it does not cause the shoes to overhang the edge of the braking surface.
I really appreciate all the advice...I did do my research but it seems maybe the info I got was not so accurate. Walden and MT both said this combo would work with minimal trimming. I contacted Walden but he is not available as the is setting a car up for the GNRS. I do like what DD did, and DD your not kidding about the cost of this stuff!! And yes DD, I didn't realize but the MT hubs seem to mount to the inside which would have made enough difference to only have to shave a bit off, if any , the backing plate. But somehow I missed your conversion post in my research. I read so many posts before I did this. Then, I thought maybe since brakes are sooo critical obtaining all the latest newest stuff would be the most efficient and safe..mmm not sure now..and Gimpy I thought of doing just that but was concerned of causing the shoes to overhang the inside of the drum surface. It's hard to tell where the shoe will end up once that cut is made until once it's made. I have done so much work on the 50s/60s cars this early stuff is new to me. But tell ya what...I'm learning fast! I am taking all this in and will also speak with Walden and see where it ends up. And, if anyone out there has this same set up please let me know. I will post on what I end up doing as it may help someone else later on...Thanks guys!!!!
As quoted by tgd61: "...concerned of causing the shoes to overhang the inside of the drum surface. It's hard to tell where the shoe will end up once that cut is made until once it's made." tgd...Try something like this. Mount your backing plate WITH shoes. DO NOT mount the drum. Take a piece of coathanger or other stiff-like wire about 12" long and roll an "eye" into one end of it by wrapping it around a bolt the same diameter as the backing plate-TO-spindle mounting bolts. Mount that piece of wire, with one of the above-mentioned bolts, on the back side (axle side) of your backing plate/spindle hole under the nut. Snug the nut up on the wire so that the wire won't move unless BENT. Now, bend the wire up so that it goes above the top of the backing plate by a couple of inches or so. Now, bend it back down so that the pointy end of the piece of wire is bent to show EXACTLY where the plane of your backing plate's lip is located. Very carefully (so as NOT to bend the wire) remove the bolt that the wire is attached to. Remove the backing plate from the spindle. Now carefully re-mount your piece of wire, making sure you use the same spindle hole, and making sure the wire is mounted on the INSIDE (toward center of axle) of the spindle flange...snug it up carefully so that it is where it was WHEN you had the backing plate mounted. Now, with the backing plate out of the way, fully slide the drum/hub on the spindle. Now you can take measurements and see where stuff really is without guessing. You can also measure where the edge of your shoes are using this method while the backing plate with shoes is mounted. DD
I like that idea...great explaination. I will give that a try. what I did do was mount the hub only on the spindle seated all the way against the inside bearing.Mmeasured how much spindle extended from the outside of the hub. Then mounted the hub and drum assem. on the spindle until it hit the backing plate. Then measured how much the spindle extended outside the hub. Took the difference between the first-- mounting hub only measurement and the drum/hub assem measurement of how much spindle extended. Talked to So Cal as I live just near them here in Sacramento. They said they use MT backing plates, Mt hubs and 37-41 spindles. the MT hubs mount inside the drum so that moves the drum out about 3/8" and then they usually have to trim about 1/8" off the backing plate.
I am running Walden hubs, 45 fin drums and Wilson Welding alum. backing plates. Everything bolted up, and fit with only redrilling my drums for 5.5 Ford. No machining! Could not have worked out better. I had to grind clearance for my stock Ford round back spindles, rather than bend them (to keep stock angles) to clear the fins on the backing plates. Works perfect. Ya'll are making this too hard.
I will re-iterate...SOME of these parts work TOGETHER! SOME of these parts DO NOT WORK...together! Do thy research!!! DD
I did. It works just fine. Was even able to use the 2 1/4" wide shoes, not the 2" that came with the backing plates from Wilson Welding. Don't think that I have any interest in M/T stuff. I just know what worked for me. Form and function. Both Walden and Wilson are hot rodders who have put countless miles on their products. They work. Nothing is perfect, but they gave me the ability to put togather a brake system that is as good as it looks. Form and function.
And I'm alway accused of over researching...I am disappointed as both Walden and MT said this my combo would work. I almost ordered Wilson backing plates and someone, can't recall who now.. recommended MT. I know someone turned me on to MT as I had no knowledge of them prior. But I do agree research research research. I looked into bending the steerings arms in a bit but I just got done checking my Akermann angles and they are right on...so no bending in steering arms for me. I assume the type of steering, and style/year and brand of arm will also have some impact on this set up. Well, this is just another post for someone else's research...maybe we should make a main link linking all the buick hub threads together..Hope this thread helps others...I'll get it to work out and as I said, whatever the outcome I will post the results.....
I mounted 1966 Buick drums AND backing plates on my 32 Ford. I used 41-48 spindles and hubs, mounted on the outside of the drums. I didn't machine any thing on the drums. I had to cut the center out of the Buick backing plate and weld in 1/8" plate to adapt the later backing plates. The 1/8" plate has to extend up into brake cyl. and top pivot cuz the later style backing plate is thinner and not strong enough to support the force on it. The later backing plates mounted different on the spindles of the Buick with self adjusting brakes. The conversion takes a little more work and thought but works very well. I have over 6000 miles on mine and the benefit of self adjusting bendix brakes and the the brake cyl. are larger dia. Buick used those brakes to 1970. Ago
I did just learn something...all my research found the 90 fin and 45 fin drums are not the same.. the skirt that extends beyond the shoe surface is about 1/4" more on the 90's than the 45's. Which caused this part of the drum to be too close to the steering rod. It has to be machined down on my application if I use the 90's. The 45's clear by plenty...The shoe surface-offset etc is dimensionally the same all around on both drums
OK looks like I got it. Had to lathe off 3/16" from the drum fins to clear the steering arm. The 90 fin drums are wider/deeper than the 45 fin. Took 1/8" off the backing plate and 3/16" off the drum shoe edge. All sets fine and looks like it should work. Thanks all for your advice...did compare the Walden hub to the MT hub. The difference in design does place the drum about 1/8" inboard more with the Walden than the MT. I do like the design and quality of the Walden and the light weight. Bobby is very helpful also with any assistance one may need after the sale.
Not that your going to need it here but if you ever need to space your hub out 1/8 to 3/16 or so buy an appropriately sized hardened external snap ring and grind off the tabs. Place the snap ring behind the bearing race before you press the race into the hub. I developed this mod changing a 58 ford f350 over from the old big 6 lug pattern to the modern 8 lug pattern. If i remember right 66-67 or 67-68 were the last 2 years for drum brakes and the first 2 years for 8 lugs on the f350. You can't use the spindles because these are also the first 2 years for twin I beam, 1958 is solid axle shared with the p350 series up to the late 70's. it was possible i could have found disc brake parts off a newer delivery van to fit the 58 f350 axle but I never could find the parts. The 58 f350 spindle was about 1/4 longer than the 67 f350 spindle, shimming the bearing races 1/8" made it work. without the shims the drum sat too far in and the outer spindle nut bottomed out before the bearings would preload. Now what I did was to shim the races in the hub NOT shim the bearings on the spindle. If it worked for a 1-ton it should work on anything else.
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