Quote:
Originally Posted by Short 3/4
I understand your frustration as I went through this same thing a few years ago. Who would have guessed that brake drums for a Chevy truck would be the hardest part of my mechanical restoration.
I too prefer the original drums, and unfortunately the 3/4 ton 4x4 stuff is unique to that model and just about extinct.
A couple things I learned that you may already know as it looks like you’ve done a lot of research:
All 3/4 ton 4x4’s came with 12x2 drums front and rear, and unfortunately unlike the 1/2 ton’s they are not interchangeable.
There were no duelly or one ton 4x4’s in 66
Sometime in 64 or 65 they changed from a separate bearing housing with slide on drums to a one piece unit with the drums and bearing housing not separate.
I got a lot of help from a guy in Southern California that runs “Drum Garden” not sure if he’s still around, but very knowledgeable and he specializes in stuff that doesn’t exist anymore. Let me know if you can’t find him, I may still have info somewhere. None of the usual parts sources have drums for 3/4 ton four wheelers, I know cuz I talked to them all!
Good luck
Tom
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Tom, thank you for spending the time to write a reply. I appreciate your input very much. I am still scratching my head on this but I think that the rear axle may have been changed at one time. It "looks" original and certainly it had been there for a long time as the U-bolts were rusted to the diameter of a pencil. Drums are definitely 13 inch. I got one of the correct (by the parts book) 12 inch drums just to be sure, but it does not fit at all. The drum from my 66 dually is the same 13 inch diameter and drill pattern but the hat portion of the drum is too high. It smacks the backing plate before the hub bearings are seated, and is way off, like by an inch or two. I cleaned up one of the original drums as it was a greasy, rusted mess. I'm going to let my local machine shop have a look at it to see if it can be cut. If that doesn't work I will see if I can get a parts guy to match it to something modern. I did find that the Drum Garden still exits. Looks like a good resource, but 3,000 miles from here. If (when) my local search fails I will give them a call. Thanks again!