Hi All:
My first post here, and probably my longest post.
Back in January, 2017 I finally found after a four year, 5 state search a 68 Road Runner. it's pretty much a driver and for sake of discussion it has solid bones, fairly good paint, perfect interior, and very solid, strong 383 auto.
I did not get much test drive time on the car before I bought it, but for what little I drove it it was very good, EXCEPT for the manual drum brakes. I knew going in to the purchase the brakes needed some attention.
I tried to save the drum brakes and go with a musclecarbrakes.com solution, but the front drums were out of tolerance for turning, so I took the plunge into a front disc conversion. I had converted my Charger back in 1993 to front disc and had three guys helping me turn the wrench. it was a fun, easy, two weekend job. I used Wilwood, and was not impressed and my stories from that are a post for another day.
So, forgetting that I'm 24 years older than the last time I tackled a disc conversion, and ignoring the fact that I don't have any wrench help like I used to, I went forward.
Afetr a month of reserach, and lots of input over at For B Bodies Only, I took everyone's advice and bought the Dr Diff conversion kit. It seems to be 'reasonable' in quality, but probably not as good as Wilwood. Time will tell, but for now, I'm at the point of no return and moving ahead very slowly with the Dr Diff kit.
According to the paper trail, my Road Runner had an entire front end replacement in 2011, and about 5K miles ago. Everything looks new steering wise. The only problem I really encountered is getting the old steering knuckles/spindles off, which took hours and hours and broke a extractor tool in the process.
The front brake lines were rounded off before my ownership, and the lines at the proportioning block were so frozen that I decided to just cut them off.
The show stoppers have been:
1) I did not know the bearing races in the rotors were different than the Dr Diff bearings races. That took a trip to my local brake shop and begged and pleaded with then to swap the rotor races for me. They did and no chnarge even, but I gave the mechanic a $10 bill.
2) The rotor shields were poorly drilled and required some filing to get proper fitment.
3) I'm waiting on brake lines from IN LINE TUBE.
What do I have so far:
1) Master Cylinder is off.
2) One rotor is on.
I also bought new rear wheel cylinders. EVERYTHING that flows brake fluid will be NEW.
So, lengthy post, but pretty much were I am now.
Question: Should I proceed with rotors and caliper mounting? Should I go ahead and bench bleed the master cylinder and install?
Thanks for any advice, moral support, or sympathy!
Have a nice day, Bill
My first post here, and probably my longest post.
Back in January, 2017 I finally found after a four year, 5 state search a 68 Road Runner. it's pretty much a driver and for sake of discussion it has solid bones, fairly good paint, perfect interior, and very solid, strong 383 auto.
I did not get much test drive time on the car before I bought it, but for what little I drove it it was very good, EXCEPT for the manual drum brakes. I knew going in to the purchase the brakes needed some attention.
I tried to save the drum brakes and go with a musclecarbrakes.com solution, but the front drums were out of tolerance for turning, so I took the plunge into a front disc conversion. I had converted my Charger back in 1993 to front disc and had three guys helping me turn the wrench. it was a fun, easy, two weekend job. I used Wilwood, and was not impressed and my stories from that are a post for another day.
So, forgetting that I'm 24 years older than the last time I tackled a disc conversion, and ignoring the fact that I don't have any wrench help like I used to, I went forward.
Afetr a month of reserach, and lots of input over at For B Bodies Only, I took everyone's advice and bought the Dr Diff conversion kit. It seems to be 'reasonable' in quality, but probably not as good as Wilwood. Time will tell, but for now, I'm at the point of no return and moving ahead very slowly with the Dr Diff kit.
According to the paper trail, my Road Runner had an entire front end replacement in 2011, and about 5K miles ago. Everything looks new steering wise. The only problem I really encountered is getting the old steering knuckles/spindles off, which took hours and hours and broke a extractor tool in the process.
The front brake lines were rounded off before my ownership, and the lines at the proportioning block were so frozen that I decided to just cut them off.
The show stoppers have been:
1) I did not know the bearing races in the rotors were different than the Dr Diff bearings races. That took a trip to my local brake shop and begged and pleaded with then to swap the rotor races for me. They did and no chnarge even, but I gave the mechanic a $10 bill.
2) The rotor shields were poorly drilled and required some filing to get proper fitment.
3) I'm waiting on brake lines from IN LINE TUBE.
What do I have so far:
1) Master Cylinder is off.
2) One rotor is on.
I also bought new rear wheel cylinders. EVERYTHING that flows brake fluid will be NEW.
So, lengthy post, but pretty much were I am now.
Question: Should I proceed with rotors and caliper mounting? Should I go ahead and bench bleed the master cylinder and install?
Thanks for any advice, moral support, or sympathy!
Have a nice day, Bill
