Hi all, I have finally made it to geting my 69 back on the road. I am looking at the brakes now and trying to decide whether to go with just replacing the drums OR going with disc swap on front and drum on back.
What is the experience of those who have faced this issue themselves?
Just for information enticement, a picture below!!

 

How often will you drive it and how hard will you drive it?

 

I will drive it sporadically like any classic but I will keep it forever. I have had it since I was a teenager, MANY years.

 

I did '78 beams with discs on my '72 short bed. Also put in a Wilwood 7/8" master cylinder and Wilwood adjustable proportioning valve. I did it more for safety than any other reason, because I didn't feel safe with the old drum brakes. Even without power assist, it stops quickly and evenly. Very happy with the update!

 

That is awesome, I am happy to hear it is so much better. I am likely going to have the disc brakes put on.

 

Or you could swap to the Crown Vic front end. Several guys are doing it and still use their truck as a truck.

 

The ability to stop is more important than the go factor. Find a late model up to 79 and swap it in. It won't be cheap because most of the replaceable parts will need to be replaced. I have done this on my 65 & 66 F250's and it made a world of difference. I would not even think of using a universal kit (most are Chevy),

 

I am of the school if the drum brakes are up to spec., good shape as should the whole braking system there is nothing wrong with drums on all 4 corners.
Even more so they way he wants to drive the truck. I have a small v8 car that has non-power 4 drums and it stops straight and will lock up all 4 if you want.
But even for a DD I still think drums are good but that is me. Now if he was going to be driving it hard and towing then maybe the disc swap.

The only other way I would do a disc swap is if I had to replace everything to get the system up to spec.
Because I had to spend money any way then why not go with disc?
Dave ----

 

I am replacing it all.

 

So what are you going to do? Are you going to source a set-up from a F100/150 up to 79 or are you going to buy a swap kit?

 

I am going with a swap kit and new drums in the back. Looking at $1500 out the door for all of it including master cylinder to include installation.

 

Here is an other option. Worked out great for me......https://w.fordification.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=86405

 

I know there are some who look at disc and drums and their eyes gloss over at shiney rotors but in use, disc never showed me an advantage worth swapping brakes for. Some of the fastest cars I've driven and stopped in, had drums on all 4 corners, there is no reason to doubt a drum brakes. My school buses I drove in the "Hill City" had drum brakes. I had a '69 340 Dart Swinger with manual drums, a '65 GTO and a '67 Chevelle SS with a swapped in 454 but they had power assit, but they also only had 9" drum brakes, same as Novas, but they stopped well enough to skid the tires if you didn't practice propper threshold braking. Up into at least 1973, Richard Petty was on Drums as was all of Nascar. I never had a situation or car where drums were inadequate or gave me reason to doubt them. We had a '68 Plymouth with 11" front drums that was a "helluva great stopper".

Drum brakes do self energise, they do not deposit brake dust on clean wheels either. Disc brakes are like grabbing a spinning disc with two fingers, the wear faster and demand more energy to apply than those self energizing drum brakes. Drum brakes stay dry in the rain, but they do get wet if fording creeks so there's that, but they quickly dry out with just a light tap of the pedal at any speed. Drum brakes as a whole maybe are heavier than a disc and caliper by just a hair, but they don't have the heavy cast iron calipers hanging on spindles or on hoses at religning time. Just take the disc, caliper, caliper brackets, pads, etc and put in opne box, then take the drum, pair of shoes, backing plate, a few springs, adjuster, wheel cylinders and put in another box and compare them. I know disc are marketed as better handlers of heat, but they too can be over heated, can boil fluid if abused, leading to brake fade. Nicely painted brake drums behind a set of Keystone or Cragar wheels are still pretty sexy, and they stay sexy. I've replaced a few bad rotors for disc brakes but only ever two for drum brakes because of rust from lack of use to the one and I just did them as a pair ... on my '77.

I was a trooper for 31 years, was assigned well over a dozen police cars over the life of my career, all had disc brakes in front but some had drums in back. Some of those cars easily used up their disc brake power too.

I'm good with drums myself. If I was getting an older vehicle back on the road from anywhere past the '60s, if I could still get spring kits, WCs, Shoes ... I'd stick with Drums. If manual, I might would add a vacuum booster, or maybe not?. I wouldn't even consider swapping from drums to disc on a driver of mine, especially if my ride didn't already have a booster, I would instead just add a booster at most and call it done.

 

The answer is really, it depends. If you have the money and the parts are readily available, then swap it. However, new properly adjusted drum brakes stop very well. If you're close to driving it and want to get some cruise time in while the weather's still nice, put the drums back on and do the swap later. Projects can often snowball and you never drive them. In the end, discs are better.