rear end swap in '53 chevy truck ?

I am going to put a '55 rear end in my '53 Chevy panel truck and use the original '53 leaf springs. Since the center of the leafs are offset forward of center line of the wheel wells do I turn the leafs around 180 to get them more towards center. I have heard of folks doing this...would like to know if it worked for you or bad idea.
If you did something else in order to use the stock springs would like to know
Any one with experiance or ideas would be appreciated..photos even better!
Thanks, Chris

 

Usually you just drill a new hole in your axle saddles about 1 3/4" -2" forward of the hole that's already there. Locate the axle in the new hole. Nothing more complicated than that.

 

yeah, what he said^^^^

 

Thanks louvers and 49... I have heard that before, guess I needed to hear it again. Sounds like a plan.
Man I love this site!

 

9" ford and weld on the spring perches

 

X2 on what need louvers said. Did it that way years ago on my 39 Chevy 2-dr when installing a 55 Chevy rear end. Worked great !!! Jeff

 

Some springs on GM cars have oppositely rolled eyes at the ends so if you swap ends the spring leaf just behind the eye hits the mounting bracket. Enough miles of this not really noticable action and the spring can snap. Ask me how I know.

 

I understand the forward hole on the new saddle or attatching a plate to the saddle with a forward hole . But I am not sure what to do about the plate on the bottom of the springs that the U bolts attatch to .( Remember that when using the original leaf springs on this era the diff goes on top of the springs)If I am going to use u bolts that go over the axle then I would have to make a plate on bottom of spring that would have a a hole forward for the spring bolt???But then this lower plate would would have a big gap between the spring because the small leaf is not long enough.???

 

That bottom leaf is longer than that isn't it. At most if you move the hole 2" the bottom plate moves the same amount. You might have to slot the hole in the bottom plate some. I only had to move the rear back 1" in order to get the wheel centered (actually a taller tire) and had no problems. If it is hanging out in air then remove that short leaf and then no gap.

Pat

 

Mock up the axle in the truck and center it in the wheelwell. Spray some paint or something in where it's sitting crooked because the pin's in the wrong place. Let it dry, then pull it out and use that as a guideline to drill new locator holes. Done, and done.

I did exactly that in a rear swap on a '50 Chevy car and it worked pretty well.