im wanting to do a straight axle conversion on my 56 chevy but have never done one before. can anybody give me any suggestions on the best way to it? and or details about it? do i have to cut my front end off and make a new frame? what axle fits under and adapts best? how much caster should i have? whats the advantage of having the shackles in the back verses the rear? any suggestions on how to get it perpendicular with the frame? what steering box will work best? or do i have to change it?
Yes. You can do it with the stock frame and a '55-59 Chevy truck axle works best if you're using a truck axle. Otherwise you probably want one of the aftermarket straight axles.
Well I've done 2 using the 55-59 axles, and they're perfect for the spring width. The early axles don't have parallel springs, and take way more work to build mounts. The late 50's are super easy to build mounts, and I like the slightly wider stance, since most gassers use narrow front tires.
Just give'n the FNG some info as far as differant axels. Some like'm wide, some like'm narrow. Just like women . No right or wrong.
Did a 55 for a freind and used speedways axle kit. Used the factory frame just unboled and removed the a arms and reused the steering box. Kit came with s10 type disk brakes and everything to do it . It was around a grand for everything.
used a 68 chevy 3/4 ton van axle on a 56, 6 leafs worked great put her up in the air good. speeds over 85 she was a handfull but we wernt building a canyon carver to start with. whitey
OH well lets see .....there must have been thousands of them built . Very common and if you do a search I am sure you will come up with plenty of information right here . If not just make a Goggle search and see how many hundred thousand come up there . If you ever pick up a Super Chevy Mag , I bet there is at least one in ever issue . Retro Jim
Yes sir , I really prefer using the 55-59 truck axle .seems like it was built for it.and as long as you are running bigs n littles the wider track width isnt even noticable . I put 3.5 inch gyros up front and 11's out back , wheel wells are full and the only thing sticking outside the car is maybe an inch of the 11's outback, Nothing sticks out up front . I even had a set of 7 inch wide roll arounds on it and they didnt even stick out . Kinda like Pontiac , just tell people its a wide track gasser lol , Make em think
I have a friend selling a rolling chassie for a tri 5 with straight axel up front, disc breaks the whole nine yards for 6k.
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