6 lug rear disc brakes

This is a sorta unique question and I'm not sure its possible, but here's the deal.....I've got a xj d44 rear with the stock 5x4.5 axle shafts and the crown vic conversion disc brakes and I am swapping a waggy d44 front in and want to match the rear axle to a 6x5.5 lug pattern. To do that, I need to get custom shafts (Moser shafts, $300 for two shafts) that will fit the xj d44 but have 6x5.5 lug pattern on them and then figure out a way to convert my brakes to 6x5.5. This is where I'm stuck at. I called the guys at TSM who do custom disc brakes and they said I should just buy their set up for around $300 bucks and I told them to shove it. I'd much rather just get a new rear axle for that price, but then I'd have to do the swap.....so the question is, can I just re drill the ford rotors to 6x5.5 or is there another way to do this. I just realized that I had to do this and am kinda at a loss as far as thoughts, so anything is welcome!

if you redrill the rotors from 5 on 4.5 to 6 on 5.5 I believe there will be no overlap. going from 5 on 5.5 to 6 on 5.5 can be done with one overlapping hole, and I would be comfortable even with that.

I have an Isuzu 44 that has 6x5.5. I have to run wheel adapters till I get the Waggy 44 up front. They are 2 piece adapters because the holes overlap. I could check my spares at home as far as what overlaps. I wonder if you could get stock rear rotors that were 6x5.5 that came OEM. My Isuzus obviously but I don't know what diameter they are. You could measure your Crowns and maybe we could come up with a substitute. Do the Crowns have drum e-brakes.

has the isuzu d44 same inners as xj d44?

I'll have to look at the crown vic ones and I wont have access to them for a few days, but I'll get back to you. Yes, they do have drum e-brakes and I just realized that it wouldn't work with the e-brakes if I went to a bigger bolt pattern. That sucks. I wonder what else could be adapted to fit the xj 44? Do you think the bolt pattern for the caliper bracket is the same or similar to the isuzu 44?

The Isuzu caliper bracket is part of the axle tube, it doesn't bolt on like everything else. However, as far as I can tell, the Isuzu brakes are identical to 8.8, ZJ, and Tera setups. So all you have to do is swap on the ZJ discs, and use the Isuzu Rotor. Then of course custom shafts for the XJ 44. In theory it should be that simple. Haven't researched the crown swap much. If they use the same calipers, etc, as the other, then you could probably get away with just using the Isuzu rotor. This is the best pic I have, second from the back. I don't think I had the caliper on at this time though.

91 Jeep Project said:

The Isuzu caliper bracket is part of the axle tube, it doesn't bolt on like everything else. However, as far as I can tell, the Isuzu brakes are identical to 8.8, ZJ, and Tera setups. So all you have to do is swap on the ZJ discs, and use the Isuzu Rotor. Then of course custom shafts for the XJ 44. In theory it should be that simple. This is the best pic I have, second from the back. I don't think I had the caliper on at this time though.

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If I'm not wrong, the tera kit is the 8.8, but I've never seen the zj disc set up and could not compare. So if they all line up, I could in theory use Moser shafts (6x5.5), Isuzu disc's, zj calipers, zj caliper brackets (or use 8.8 stuff instead of zj) and just figure out the lines from there? Do you have any measurements for the discs or calipers or anything that we could compare with someone who has the zj or 8.8 discs? That would be awesome!

53guy said:

If I'm not wrong, the tera kit is the 8.8, but I've never seen the zj disc set up and could not compare. So if they all line up, I could in theory use Moser shafts (6x5.5), Isuzu disc's, zj calipers, zj caliper brackets (or use 8.8 stuff instead of zj) and just figure out the lines from there? Do you have any measurements for the discs or calipers or anything that we could compare with someone who has the zj or 8.8 discs? That would be awesome!

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I don't have any measurements, but know for a fact that Tera, 8.8, and ZJ are identical as far as Calipers, Rotors, and Ebrakes go. I have had the ZJ parts at one point, own the Tera right now, have been able to compare with the 8.8s, and used to own the zuzu setup. So I am fairly certain about it. All it will take is runnin' up to your parts store and having them pull a zuzu rotor and a ZJ one, and compare from there. Just check for the hat depth and thickness, contact area thickness, rotor OD, and ID for the ebrakes.

Going to be doing that as soon as I get off duty and I'll let you know how it turns out. I think that the zj should be easiest to find where I'm at, so that works out well. What are you running in the rear at the moment? Disc's or drums? On what axle? What's the width on the zuzu?

Right now I have a stock 8.25 under my rig. But the axle waiting to go in is a XJ 44 with Tera Discs. The Zuzu axle that I had was around 60" WMS, XJ is 61.75". It's currently under my buddy's '01 to match his waggy 44 front.

Damn 91, you da man. I didn't know all that was compatible. So riddle me this, will 8.8, Tera, or ZJ calipers bolt up to Zuzu brakes? I was lucky enough to get all my stuff together but zuzu calipers are very expensive and metric. Could I use other calipers that are standard?

I don't have anything for ya 53, 91 is way past me for info.

I never compared before I got rid of the axle. But I needed new calipers for it. And I had planned on trying ZJ versions (because of the cost of the damn things, as you know) Never got around to it though, definitely worth looking into.

If you havent already read the "zuki nissan brake sorry mo" thread at PBB:

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=174851

I was looking for 5 on 5.5" stuff but IIRC there was good bit of discussion on the 6 on 5.5" stuff in that thread too. FWIW I ended up with Suzuki Sidekick vented front rotors and calipers and Wilwood spot caliper e-brakes. I've got it mocked up in cardboard templates but haven't gotten to cutting any steel yet.

Read the entire thing and didn't seem to be anything that pertained to the 6x5.5 other than that everyone gave up and just made it work with chevy stuff and fabbed up some brackets that they welded on. In the end, I might just do the same, but I'd prefer to get something that I don't have to fab up as there isn't a ton of room between the spring pad and the end of the axle tube. I'd like to do it as easy as possible for the sake of replacement parts.

53guy said:

Read the entire thing and didn't seem to be anything that pertained to the 6x5.5 other than that everyone gave up and just made it work with chevy stuff and fabbed up some brackets that they welded on. In the end, I might just do the same, but I'd prefer to get something that I don't have to fab up as there isn't a ton of room between the spring pad and the end of the axle tube. I'd like to do it as easy as possible for the sake of replacement parts.

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That's more or less what I wanted to end up with (no machining of replacement wear items).

IMO the easiest solution is:

* find a rotor that will fit over your axle flange. Turn down the flange 1/16"-1/8" if necessary.

* redrill your lug pattern on your axle to your desired pattern and get new lugs (might as well, cheap and renews the fatigue life of the lugs). Might be a good time to go custom alloy axles while you got it apart.

* fab bracket to mount caliper that matches above rotor (keep pairs matched - waggy caliper with waggy rotor for example)

* fab bracket to mount separate, stand-alone e-brake if you care about such things. Sounds expensive but comparing prices of calipers with built in e-brakes to calipers and e-brakes separately it seems to be a wash.

* add decent prop valve.

In my case I was able to "sandwich" the outer hub assembly between the two brackets and the axle flange itself. This is on a FF 44. There is no welding to the axle tube. The only welding is of the standoffs (steel spacers) on the caliper bracket to position it in the correct location relative to the rotor. Even that is not really necessary, I just like adding gussets to stuff for bling.

I'd snap pics of what I'm talking about but no cycles for the next few days... making arrangements to travel to a funeral in the AM.

HTH