I am now the owner of a '66 Barracuda! I was sure it would have 9" drums, but it has 10s. Looking at Rock Auto's web site I've found that 10" drum A-bodies like my Barracuda use A2 and A6 wheel bearing sets just like a similar year B-body. I'm thinking that the large bolt pattern B-body drum hub would fit my spindle. Anyone know for sure if the B-body drum hub fits the 10" drum A-body spindle? I want big bolt pattern hubs to serve as the basis of a disc brake swap using some big rotors and JFZ calipers I already own. The Stainless Steel Brakes kit is too expensive and I don't care for the rotor and caliper that Scarebird uses in their conversion.

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Joshua

I doubt it, The A-body drum width should be 1 3/4" while the B/E-body should be 2 1/2". So at the very least the backing plates won't match. Are you sure they weren't refering to post '73 drum brakes?

You could also do the reverse setup, use B/E-body drum brake spindles on your A-body. All you would need to do is change the upper control arm to match the ball joint and the spindles should be cheap, every B/E-body owner wants the A-body disk brake spindles to swap over to disk brakes.

All I care about is if the pre-1973 10" B-body drum brake hub (which uses the same A2 and A6 bearings as the pre-1973 A-body 10" drum brake hub) will fit the A-body 10" drum spindle. None of the drum brake parts except the hub and spindle will be used.

B-body ball joints are not the same so I would have to swap all 4 ball joints and the upper control arms to use B-body spindles.

I don't need doubts. I need knowledge. I've got a friend with the front suspension and 10" drum brakes from his '70 Satellite sitting in the weeds behind his shop. When he is back in town I'll borrow a drum and hub, separate the hub from the drum and see if it fits my spindle.

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Joshua

If I remember correctly from when I had my 66 barracuda ( ) AMC used a 10 inch drum brake with the 4.5 bolt circle that will slide righton to the A-body hub and will work with Mopar hardware.

Reed,

I read about the AMC hub and they do use the same bearings. Problem is AMCs are even harder to find in wrecking yards than Chrysler products. Also, the wheel bearing seal bore, according to the seal info I found, is .008" smaller on the AMC hub, but I can deal with the hub on a friend's lathe or take a file to the seal OD.

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Joshua

Oh.

Of all the brake update/upgrades that have been published, not one has a B-body hub on a pre '73 A-body spindle. So that must mean something. Since I don't have the parts in front of me, I would suspect the B-body hub is deeper then what the A-body spindle will allow.

Yeah, AMC stuff us getting harder to find, and it was the 9" drum that supposely swapped over.

I'll find out for sure if the B-body hub fits or not. I don't think anyone has been interested in this kind of swap as drag racers typically cared little about brakes beyond stopping for the turn-out (they only wanted the bigger bolt pattern rather than better brakes) and most everyone who wanted better brakes when straight to discs.
That makes no sense. Our 9" drum brake cars use A1 and A4 wheel bearings while pre '73 10" drum brake A-bodies, similar year B-bodies and many AMCs use A2 and A6 wheel bearings.

Can we please put a halt to the guessing and conjecture? If you haven't done or tried what I'm proposing then you probably don't have the facts. I'm sure someone knows, but that someone isn't replying to this thread.

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Joshua

Last night I scored a pair of front drums from a '73 Javelin for $25. They use the same bearings and seals as most all mid '60s and newer AMC cars so if it's true that a Gremlin hub will fit a 10" drum-brake A-body spindle then I have big bolt pattern hubs for the Barracuda. Next up is to test fit the hubs then to mock up the 11.75 x 1.25" rotors, brake hats and JFZ calipers. Having a loose spindle to play with would make life much easier. I don't really want to tear the backing plate and all the rest of the brakes off the Barracuda as it currently runs, drives and stops.

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Joshua

Not sure it was the same with the Barracuda, but I do have info on the Dart. 10" drums were standard on the 66 V-8 models, extra cost as HD brakes on the /6s. KH disk brakes were optional on both models.

The drum was not deep and did not have radial fins on it as later drums did. Instead, it had a couple of ridges cast into the drum that ran around the circumference. It was surprisingly light weight. Not surprisingly, it wasn't very good for repeated hard usage.

The backing plates will need to match the drum diameter and offset as well as bolt-up, properly centered on the spindle. Otherwise, it won't work properly.

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You can't fix stupid. - Ron White

Yep, know all about the factory brake options. What I'm attempting here is to put custom large bolt pattern disc brakes on the car while keeping my current spindles and ball joints.

In my first post I wrote: "I want big bolt pattern hubs to serve as the basis of a disc brake swap using some big rotors and JFZ calipers I already own. The Stainless Steel Brakes kit is too expensive and I don't care for the rotor and caliper that Scarebird uses in their conversion."

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Joshua