Re: [Amc-list] Cheap brake conversion

[Frank Swygert <farna@xxxxxxx>]

I can only second most of the comments made by Tom and Mark. 79-83 are the AMC brakes to get for a retrofit, with the 82-83 GM floating caliper preferred. There are problems with most of the others, though the Kelsey-Hayes setup would be my third choice (82-83 first, 79-81 second -- which I'm running now). 

The Scarebird setup for AMCs seems to fit ALL drum brake cars. One person had some concerns when they found that the seal fits very far over the seal adapter. After talking with Scarebird and another person who installed the same setup (but has more AMC and general mechanic experience) I've confirmed that it's just supposed to be that way (I also test fit them on a 63 Classic and 65 American, and even a 62 American). The edge of the seal just does fit on the adapter, but there's no pressure on the seal from either side so it's not a problem -- it's really just a dust and moisture seal. The caliper may have to be spaced a bit on some models, but nothing that a couple washers won't take care of... it's more of a "fine tuning" thing due to a slight variation in the thickness of the base of the spindle over the years (or for different models?). The Scarebird adapters can be used with disc brake spindles also, but spacers may be required to get the caliper bracket and calipers ali
 gned properly. I haven't tried it, though I do have a set of the adapters here. Don't have a set of disc spindles handy, but they should be thinner than drum spindles to make up for the thickness of the factory caliper bracket adapter. 

-----------
Date: Sat, 12 Jul 2008 20:04:31 -0700
From: Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>

John Widiker wrote:

> > I have had great luck with scarebird stuff myself, did one of their disk retrofits on a 52 buick and it all fit great works really well
>   

That's really good to hear! Yeah, it's just uncharted territory, I 
think, for us AMCers.

-- 
Frank Swygert
Publisher, "American Motors Cars" 
Magazine (AMC)
For all AMC enthusiasts
http://farna.home.att.net/AMC.html
(free download available!)


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