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1946 Plymouth Coupe Rear Brake Upgrade


Ivey

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I am planning a brake upgrade on a low mileage original business coupe.   I have found several options for front disc brake upgrades.  I am looking for ideas to upgrade the rear drums either with discs or newer style self adjusting drums.  Does anyone know of backing plates and brake assemblies that will work on the original rear end?  

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ECI hot rod brakes has a front disc upgrade, a rear disc upgrade (using the OEM axle) and a master cylinder bracket to add a dual circuit master cylinder. Quite spendy considering you can swap an 8.8 disc rear replace front coils and rear leaves etc for the cost of their rear kit. 

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Jersey Harold - you cut off most of the backing plate so it becomes in essence a bearing and seal retainer. You remove the drum from the hubs and reuse them. The tricks are the standoff’s and the caliper adapter...No changes to the emergency brake - still using the trans mounted brake for that.

Edited by Dartgame
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2 hours ago, Dartgame said:

Jersey Harold - you cut off most of the backing plate so it becomes in essence a bearing and seal retainer. You remove the drum from the hubs and reuse them. The tricks are the standoff’s and the caliper adapter...No changes to the emergency brake - still using the trans mounted brake for that.

Interesting approach.  Thanks for the info.

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5 hours ago, Dartgame said:

Jersey Harold - you cut off most of the backing plate so it becomes in essence a bearing and seal retainer. You remove the drum from the hubs and reuse them. The tricks are the standoff’s and the caliper adapter...No changes to the emergency brake - still using the trans mounted brake for that.

I'm lost on this. Why go that route when you can get a very modern amd reliable disc system. Stops better, parts easily available, very reliable. An 8.8 disc moves the parking brake to the rotors. I'm not sold on the ECI kit for a couple reasons. Namely the keeping the old rear as I'm not a big fan if the 4.10 ratio. If stopping is a priority, as well as reliability, ease of maintenance and durability, I'd swap the complete rear. The original brakes are ridiculous expensive and the fact that a special tool is needed to install makes keeping the drums more a novelty. If the bendix plates use the same drums and internals why do it in the first place. 

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Hoopty - my car has 40 Kmiles on it and the axle works fine, and has no leaks, the wheel bearings are like new. That was my reasoning. I agree with your logic, I was planning to do an 8.8 swap but when I found I could get discs for the rear I went that way instead. The brakes themselves are all late model parts easily available. If I do end up having problems an axle swap is the plan.

Edited by Dartgame
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On 2/15/2018 at 8:16 AM, Ivey said:

What bendix backing plates did you adapt to the rear axle? What vehicle did that come from

My brakes came off of a 65 Coronet, but the backing plates from a lot of different years will work.  They are 10 inch drums, but you could probably adapt the 11 inch drum set up as well.  I also bought 8 3/4 bearing retainers. Since they were thick (plenty strong), I Bolted them to the flange behind the backing plates. I didn’t have to cut up the original backing plates this way.

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