upgrade to bigger rear brake drums

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fleming442

Captain Tenneal
Dec 26, 2013
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Seems like a whole bunch of parts scrounging and mix-matching when you could just replace and reinforce the wheel cylinders on what you have. :unsure: Bigger drum brakes and more effective drum brakes are the same as far as I'm concerned. The issue with over braking the front/rear bias remains. OP, have you upgraded the fronts or, are you just throwing a bigger anchor off the stern?

Oh, well, have fun with that!
 
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ssn696

Living in the Past
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Jul 19, 2009
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GM used a four-bolt trapezoid pattern for rear brakes for decades, then cheaped out in 1978 on the Gbody. If you swap to either Blazer brakes or A-body drums, you have to recreate the bolt pattern. Ironically, the two small holes in the G-body brake flange line up perfectly, just need to be drilled to the larger size. The harder part is committing to cutting down the flange to fit the rest of the backing plate for either conversion.
 
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g3chevy

Greasemonkey
Jan 30, 2019
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Playing with 3rd gen A bodies for many years I've noticed all the rear ends from 73-75 use a 9.5" rear drum. Only 76 & 77 A bodies were upgraded to 11" drums with the exception of police vehicles from 73-75 that were ordered with "heavy duty" brakes. I think if I were going to the trouble of upgrading rear brakes I would go the route of a rear disc brake setup and be done with it.

Rear from 74 El Camino
20190407_190502_resized.jpg


Rear from 77 El Camino
20190409_160752_resized.jpg
 
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