Short an sweet, Anyone know how much trouble it would be to convert from rear brake drums to rotors. Any thoughts would be appreciated

 

they arent too bad i did em on my girfreinds pontiac a while back ( i know diff setup) but you can get kits through some specialty shops brembo makes some and raebesto i think too..but the price isnt light either..

 

You will also need the proportioning valve assembly and I believe ABS stuff.

You may be further ahead finding a donor disc brake axle with the hardware already welded in place. You can swap gears if the ratios aren't the same and the axles are both D70's or D80's.

 

I would do the front upgrade long before I did the rears.........70% of your braking comes from the front so lets say that the disc brakes in the rear are a 20% improvement over the drums then your only talking about a six percent improvement overall. If you did the fronts you'll get a 33% improvement over the stocks and your total improvement will be 23% over all.

The cost of doing this will be about $130 more then the putting new stock brakes on. Pretty cheap if you already have seventeen inch or larger wheels.

good luck

Oh and I forgot to mention that the parking brake on the rear disc brakes suck.......compared to the drums

 

agreed, I too have the larger fronts, and prior to doing them I thought the rears would be the way to go...but the improvement gained from doing the fronts has far out weighed anything I can get from my rears, also drum rears do have a working/holding park brake set up vs rear disc P-brake

if you have not seen this link, it will show whats involved with pictures and part numbers

http://www.cumminsforum.com/forum/98...6k-beware.html

 

Good post. I agree completely. After working on these trucks for years, I am very happy to have rear drums and think discs would be a step backwards. The rear discs really don't handle the crap that gets kicked up by the front tires, so the slides will constantly be seizing up. Also, as mentioned, the emergency brakes will be almost useless.

 

17" wheels clear the third gen fronts on your truck! Find yourself some 17"+ wheels, and pick up the following for the STOOPID EASY conversion.

04 caliper brackets
04 pads and rotors
04 dust shields if you want to add a pita to it. (not needed)

You won't BELIEVE the difference!