Need a pic or two of the steering arm on a 1953-56 Olds 88/98. Don't know if they are different.... Thanks!
I will bring this up cause I am interested in where this is going.... I have a 53 olds 88 and can take pics of what your looking for and post them, I also have a manual that should have cutaway shots of the suspension. I know this does not help but here are front pics of a 53 olds 98
That helps out quite a bit. Can you get another shot from the backside, showing the steering arm and upper control arm? It may require removal of the wheel. Thank you for the help!
Here are 3 black and white shot from uner my 55 Olds Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Hope they help I can take other High Res images if needed, just let me know what angles.
Thank you. yes, we need a shot from the inside towards the wheel, showing the steering arm and tie rods. Funny thing is thisspindle hub is SO close to the Pontiac setup it hurts. The only real discernable difference is the length of the stub.
Do you have pics of the pontiac setup. I took pics with my camera phone cause my camera took a dump. I will post them tomorrow at work after I clean them up a bit. So I am guessing you are building a disc brake kit for Olds? How do you go about the bearings, I am assuming there is machining of the spindles? I have been looking into this but not too many people around here will even touch the spindles. Also, are all 53 - 56 spindle assemblies the same? I know that there are differences between the 51-53 then the 54-56 in regards to frame and body, etc, but is the suspension the same for those years, I really don't know that is why I am asking. If they are the same then a will 55 spindles/kit fit a 53? I am interested in knowing. I will post my pics tomorrow. I also have a spare set of 53 Olds spindles and uprights if you need measurements. Rey
Thank you. We have a spindle and knuckle- just missing the steering arm itself. When we build a bracket, we try not to mod the spindle at all. Currently, we will reuse the drum hub, bearings and seal. If we find the demand is great enough, we will have hubs made the use tapered roller bearings. We did this with the 55-57 Pontiac, and eventually was enough demand to make a 4140 steel adapter bushing to allow the 71-76 Bonneville rotor and bearings to be used. I have no clue if the Olds market is this big or not. if you have a spare steerng arm, we would like to talk to you. Also, we need to figure out what side OUR spindle is... The pic is our 55-57 Pontiac. it uses 69-78 Eldo calipers, and 71-76 Bonny rotors- with some expensive bushings! This was the prototype.
I don't know if the Olds spindles are the same as the Caddy's or not, but I am currently working on a conversion for my 55 Cad, late 70's gmc 1/2 ton hub and rotor fits my spindle using the GMC roller bearings with a 1/4" spacer. From your pictures the spindle looks very similar
Here are the pics. They are pretty crappy, but it'll give you an idea. Hope it works out, as far as demand goes, personally I think there is, maybe I am bias, but as an olds owner who feels swapping a clip to have disc brakes is not always the answer I would be really interested in purchasing a kit. Please keep us posted. Let us know how this turn's out, and BTW my olds can be your guinea pig on your first kit... I know that kinda pushing it, but I thought I'd throw that in there.... Rey
contact mrrocket he has done it before, we were going to do it on mine before he moved but never got to it. I don't remember there being anything weird about the steering arm, but it was a few years ago that we were talking about it. There was somebody selling a kit on a well known auction site a couple of years ago, they were pretty proud of it but it looked like a good setup.
are you just worried about a clearance issuse?is that why you need a arm? mabye not worth anything,but keep in mind that the power,and manual arms are slightly differant.let me know if you need part # help. eric
Glad to here that. ANY info we can get is worthwhile- GM made all sorts of minor changes back then...
streetrodgarage.com has a kit they advertise for the 55. I have not called them to see if it will work on my 56. Or for some reason the 55 is a orphan.
If you get a kit together I can road test one for you on a daily driver 56 in the mountains of WV & VA. Where good breaks are needed but bad breaks are fun.
Mike Pemberton on the OCA forums was offering disc kits, or possibly disc kit plans, for earlier Olds's. Not sure if he has something for the year you want, but it's worth checking into.
Ok, this is what we have... The stub on the Olds is painfully close to the Pontiac spindle- everything would bolt up fine if the taper just inboard of the outer bearing was the same. We use a sleeve in the 55-57 Pontiac app- if we trim it down some- it should fit fine. Later versions may use a 74-78 Ford full size rotor. Our other option is to keep the hub, and it's ball bearings.... The Olds steering arm looks very similar to the Pontiac unit, which msses the rotor by about a 1/16" of an inch. You may get a chance to do some light Hambin' here to get it all to sit right, but with 12 x 1-1/4" rotors and 69-78 Eldo calipers stopping will not be an issue... even in WV
You should not need anything new except the brake lines to fit hte new caliphers, rotors, caliphers and pads. It is ReALLY simple once you measure out hte bracket. You will have to space the rotor from the spindle/backing plate, but can find spacers at home depot. You'll figure it out when you get to that point. Im not sure how far along you are, but heres the main points. aquire mid 60's Olds Toranado calipers/pads and rotors. These slide on using your original bearings and seals. Strip your spindles of all drum brake parts. Get sturdy cardboard. install the rotors onto the cars as though you were assmbling the brakes. slide the calipers onto the rotors where you want them (basically, you want them on the rear of hte rotor, raised up to clear your tie rods, etc, about 2 inches off midline). You want to mark your cardboard and then "bolt it onto the spindle, then carfully mark/measure the distance from each spindle bolt to the calipers bolts. This is the fun part. This will take you a lot of time and paitence, and cardboard, so get a 12 pack and some good tunes. Let me know when you get this far.
If only it was that easy... For starters, the Toronado rotors are a hat style, which means you will need to remove the drum from the hub, cut down the diameter, and press in new studs to make up the difference in thickness. Second, the Olds, like Pontiac and Cadillac, have the steering arm mounted outside of the spindle , so if you are to mount your plate on the outside , you will need welded in spacers on the upper hole. The Toro rotor is pretty shallow, and will not work with the stock rims, and may require a goofy offset to fit. It takes more than some stiff cardboard and a half-rack to make this work properly. I am working on making custom hubs for this that should also work on Pontiacs, Buicks, Olds Caddy, and Sweptline trucks ... These hubs will have the studs already installed and use modern tapered bearings.
Let me back up a step here. It is that easy. You will have to knock the hub out of the original drum, read large hammer(sorry its been a couple years), and you will have to then cut out a little from the inside diameter of the new rotor to allow the original hub to fit. You wont need to drill or cut the lugbolt holes though. You need longer bolts though, but those can be had at any parts store. As for the cardboard. Yeah, you can take and make a form out of it. Once you make the form, If your decent with a torch you can cut it, then drill press it and tap your treads. What I did was make a rough caliper bracket with the torch, drilled my holes and all, and test fitted it. THen I gave it to FatassBuick and he machined me 4 plates. For the rims, I used GMC truck steel wheels from the early 70's. Every shitty junk yard has them. They looked stock, I ran a wider wheel anyway. I don't believe i spaced anything on the backing plate, but if you get there and need to, at this point it should be pretty simple. Now notice, earlier, I said patience is needed. If you want this set up, and dont want to pay someone $$ to do it, and are failry competent in mechanics, you can do this. I may actually have two brackets somewhere. I look and get back to you
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