Ok Ive searched all the arcives about the front brake conversion. I need some assurance from a veteran that the donor car I must hunt down is the correct vintage for my 66 malibu upgrade. 77-81 Lemans 73-77 monte or 74-79 nova

all '69-72 GM A-body, '69 F-body, and 69-74 X-body cars.

Chevy: Chevelle, El Camino, Monte Carlo, Camaro, Nova
Buick: Skylark, GS, Apollo
Oldsmobile: Cutlass, Cutlass "S", 4-4-2, Omega
Pontiac: LeMans, GTO, Firebird, Ventura
GMC: Sprint


67-68s of the same cars will also work, but they have 4-piston calipers, are much more expensive to fix, and are extremely rare (and valuable to those with '67-68 cars)

Do a search under "B-body" or "Tall Spindles" to look into that option as well. (costs about the same, sometimes more, but handles better and have 12" discs for more stopping power)

The swaps are the exact same for any '64-72 chevelle, so if the topic is about a different year, all the same info still applies to your car.

Thanks Derek for the guidance to A VERY POPULAR TOPIC!!! with patience I shall find answers to most of my questions. 79shovel

The list of years and cars provided by Derek69 is the simple direct swap which requires no modifications of parts. The cars in that list have spindles where the caliper brakets are separate and bolt onto the spindles. About 1973-74 GM began to cast the caliper braket together with the spindle. They are all together, one cast piece. They are also a bit "taller". Hence these later year cars are donors for the "tall spindle swap" described in many posts. Tall spindles slightly change steering geometry and will involve some minor modificaitons of your control arms to make it all work. But not extensive mods. Remember that later year cars with tall spindles ran bigger thicker rotors which may be attractive to you, as opposed to 69-72 A bodies were the rotors were only 11 inches diameter and thinner than later years. Your choice here.

ok, folks i'm new here but:
i have a 66 chevelle with 4 wheel drums. i also have a 79 el camino with factory disks on it. what i was wondering is could i take the whole upper and lower control arms with spindles and brakes off of the 79 elky and put it on my 66 ???

anything?

ok, i dont think the control arms will work , but i took the spindles off and they are the same height(measured from top to bottom) as my drum spindles.
anybody know if i could use these 79 elcamino spindles on my 66 drum car ??????????

I have 79-85 cadillac rear calipers w/ebrake on my 66 chevelle ss. I am replacing my rear hoses. Does anyone know which hydraulic hose will work for this application.

Remember that later year cars with tall spindles ran bigger thicker rotors which may be attractive to you, as opposed to 69-72 A bodies were the rotors were only 11 inches diameter and thinner than later years. Your choice here BHawk,

That is not entirely accurate... The bigger/thicker roters were on full-size cars (Caprice, etc) with optional 12-inch rotors... I think (not 100%) that the donors that 79Shovel listed (73+ Malibu/LeMans, 74+Nova, etc) actually used a smaller rotor than the 1969-1972 Chevelle, and maybe a smaller caliper.

I can't recall, but you usually don't hear alot about those donors because they aren't as desirable (kind of like the S-10 disc swap?)...

And generally, the "tall spindle" swap is either the full-size car (with 11 or 12 inch rotors), OR the 70-80 F-body (with 11 inch rotors). I have never heard of the 73+ Montes, 77+Malibus/LeMans or the 74+ novas having the "tall spindles" (maybe, but I don't recall)...

Tony,
You can probably adapt those 79 brakes, but they may not be the best choice unless you have a budget issue (but better than drums)...

Tony,
You can probably adapt those 79 brakes, but they may not be the best choice unless you have a budget issue (but better than drums)...

will i just have the whole 79 car and just wanted discs. i mean its free, u can't beat that. and they work fine.

iwas just wondering if i could reuse by drum car ball joints with the 79 spindles? they are not tall spindles, they are exactly the same height.

any help ?????

waste of time Tony, the brakes on the G bodies are not enough to stop that, and weighs a few hundred pounds less. You gain nothing in terms of suspension geomtry change and no the ball joint tapers are not the same. Way too much work for no gain.

the tapers look the same to me, i would figure swapping to discs would be a good thing, i mean they stopped the 79 elky good?

Good working drum brakes will stop better than undersized discs.

You ever happen to look through the wheels on a tractor/trailer....drum brakes.

The '74 Nova and clones is NOT the same as '75 and newer. The '74 is closer to the original disc brakes on the Chevelles from '69 to '72, except the steering linkage is on the wrong side of the centerline. You could unbolt the steering arm from the spindle, and swap them side-to-side to make this right for an "A" body, I'm told.

The '75-79 Nova uses the more modern, stronger spindle design. This same design was used on the '73-'77 "A" body, the '70 1/2-'81 or '82 "F", and '77-'96 "B". Note that in '78 it was redesigned to be lighter yet stronger still, and somewhere in there the bearing sizes changed, too, They were made in 11" and 12" versions, so you have to be careful to match rotors to the spindle, as well as stud circle of the rotor to the wheels you're using. The "B" body rotors, for example, uses a 5" bolt circle, whereas our elderly "A" body has 4 3/4.

the "X" body rear steer disks can be used by installing the steering arms from the chevelle drum spindles. Cant swap steering arms side to side, doesnt work.