1965 Valiant:

Are rear disc brakes work messing with on a driver?

No they aren't but I think that front discs are essential for driving among the cell phoning denizens of our present day streets and highways. The ten inch rear drums are more than enough for an A-body. The 9 inchers are borderline but probably enough as long as you have a good front disc setup and proper proportioning.

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"Former Owner" of '65 Barracuda, 225, Auto, MP 2bbl intake, MP cam, Dutra Duals. Presently Moparless.

Too many variables to answer the question definitively. Congested city traffic is actually something the 9" drums handle fairly well, because vehicle speeds never get high enough to need much more! Are disc brakes better, and a nice thing to have? Certainly. Are they necessary? Well...no, generally not, on a daily driver. Case in point, my newly-purchased '71 Dart, factory equipped with 9" drums, which needs brakes to pass inspection. I gave some thought to quickly gathering parts for a disc swap (factory small-bolt, factory large-bolt or maybe Scarebird) but decided just to renew the stock 9" units instead. Hey, those brakes have stopped this car quickly enough in this traffic to avoid front-end damage since the car was purchased in late 1970!

I pushed 9" drums to a much deeper extreme when I drove a car so equipped in Denver for a decade, including trips up to the mountains (and back down!) for skiing. You cannot start applying 9" drums at the top of a mountain and just stay on 'em all the way down the hill. No way. You get on 'em hard, get off 'em and let them cool, get on 'em again, etc. I never crashed.

How fast do you drive on a regular basis? Given a normally-loaded car with brakes (9", 10" or disc) in good repair, there'll be no significant difference in stopping distance at normal surface traffic speeds. If you do a lot of driving at 70+ mph, or live in the mountains (or San Francisco!), your situation may vary. But you can buy yourself extra stopping durability from the 9" drum setup by installing a set of the '70-'72 finned 9" front drums, which are much more massive and better able to reject heat.

It really all depends on what kind of driving you do, how much of a demand you place on your brakes, and what kind of money you do or don't want to spend.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

Thanks guys. What they call mountains around here would hardly make foothills out west. With this stock setup (3.23?) I rarely get above 65. Gotta get OD. There's a thought. Thanks