9" Disc Brakes

I have searched on Pirate4x4 and Colorado4x4 but haven't found a whole lot of info on converting a 9" to disc brakes, so I thought I'd check here. Its a 78 F-150 31 spline big bearing with 5:13's and a detroit. I got it with no shafts or brakes it was a 28 spline unit, that is now set-up for 31 splines. So I'm now ready to set the brakes up and bolt it in, I want to retain my parking brake, I've read about using zuki rotors and trooper calipers and I've read about f-150 44 rotors and caddy or K-10 calipers but I haven't seen any good writes up's. Any info good or bad lemme have it THANKS!

do yourself a favor and get some Ford Explorer disc brakes and backing plates of an 8.8 in the bone yard... straight bolt on for the ford 9"... I have the same set up on my 9" that I am building but all new parts.. with crown vic calipers.... MORE has the e-brake cables if your not comfortable with crimping your existing cables into a loop for the ford ebrake lever... I hope this helps...

Scott.

You can get weld on caliper brackets from just about any dirt track racing supplier for either K10 or Caddy calipers. I got mine at Poske Racing in Parkersburg Wv. I used K10 calipers and CJ 7 rotors to get the same bolt pattern. And none of the auto parts supplier had just F-150 rotors. It was hub/rotor all in one. You have to grind alittle off the stud flange of the axle to get the rotors to fit. Not enough to hurt anything maybe 1/16 all the way around. And there was a small lip inside the rotor I had to grind. But all in all an easy upgrade. Total was $100 with all new parts

Here is a good right up from pirate4x4...

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=229934

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=253241

Explorer brakes use a different bolt pattern.

Try these for bolt on w/Ebrake. 300 bucks
http://www.gefracing.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=G&Product_Code=M2300G

I went the cheap route when I did mine.....based on one of the pirate threads.

I used nissan maxima rear calipers from the junkyard....suzuki samurai front rotors....and custom made caliper brackets. It works well....cost me about $100...and I have an ebrake too.

Let me know if you have any questions or need some photos.

Brian

Brian, thanks for the tip on the nissian and zuki set-up. I've got a few questions though to determine whether I use this route or the chevy caddy route. Did the zuki rotors fit over the facotry nine inch axle stud flanges, or did you have to shave alittle off? Also from the pictures on your site did you bolt your custom made braket to the housing ends? Where there any customs spacers used to offset the non longer needed backing plate from the drums? Was your rear a tapered bearing one or a sealed bearing I don't know if mine being a tapered bearing 31 spline will have an affect on my outcome. thanks a ton for all your help.-steve

I replied to your PM, but I suppose this is good information to have here as well.

The reason why I went the route that I did was because I read quite a few complaints about the performance of the caddy calipers.

I've had some zuki rotors fit over the stud flanges....and others that didn't. It really depends on the brand....and I'm not sure why. If you do have to shave it, it isn't very much and it can be done with an angle grinder like I did.

I bolted the custom brackets to the housing with grade 8 hardware.

I did have to use custom spacers from my plates to the calipers to get the position of them correct. I could measure them if you need me to, but I think they are about 5/8" thick. I cut down a couple of 1" tcase drop spacers that I got for free.

I also cut out the drum backing plate to match the shape of the bolt pattern on the axle flange....that keeps your spacing correct for seals and bearings and what not.

I have tapered roller bearings on my axle shafts that have seals behind them. I'm not sure if that is what you're talking about or not.

Let me know if you have any other questions or need some more photos.

Brian

Depending on how much your looking to spend, there are some nice looking kits on ebay that look complete and fairly easy to install. I just finsihed swaping in my rear 9 and will be looking into discs down the road so i'm interested in what everyone has done as well!

Here is the pirate thread with good info.....the first few pictures show why you have to use spacers to set the calipers in the right spot.

I'll try to take some pictures of mine since it is a lot cleaner than that is:

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=174851

i went cheap and ran the 11" drums for two reasons:
better brakes than the stock 7"? drums
bigger e-brake surface than the discs.

discs are set up with a drum inside the rotor hat as the e-brake, and personaly, that is not enough for me (i drive a manual, so the e-brake is more importaint to me than all of you with "Park")

that said, i still try to not leave the vehicle when it is running...

that and a complete new brake system with turned drums, new springs, new shoes, and new cylenders was something like 60.00

XJ_ranger said:

discs are set up with a drum inside the rotor hat as the e-brake, and personaly, that is not enough for me (i drive a manual, so the e-brake is more importaint to me than all of you with "Park")

Click to expand...

I agree that the 8.8 style discs (with the drum inside the rotor for an ebrake) suck. I've worked on them and they aren't fun.

The disc setup that I run doesn't work like that though. It just squeezes the caliper as if you had applied the brake. I drive a manual too and I use my ebrake both for parking and occasionally on the trail when it requires fancy foot work. I can't say that it is the BEST brake setup ever, but it works well when I use it and it wasn't much more than your drums.

Here are a couple of pictures with the calipers mounted. Hopefully that clears up a some things.

Damn rusty rotors.



The cut down tcase drop spacers that I used for the calipers can be seen on the outside of the caliper mounting brackets....just opposite the bolt head in the photo.