[dablack]

Hey Guys,

Has anyone considered putting a 8.8 under you cars? I've been looking around and found some mustang guys are running the explorer rears in their 60s mustangs. They get big disk brakes and they usually come w/ lcoking 3.55 gears. I looked on car-parts.com and found lots in my area (houston) for $400 complete. You do have to take off the spring perches and weld on the ones we need at a different spacing. If you wanted to swap to deeper gears and a traction lock then this might be the ticket. Any opinions?

thanks
Austin

 

[ZeroTolerance]

Hhmm...if you can get a hold of a Lincoln Versailles rear, you solve your disc brake problems. That is, if you've got a 9" under your car.

There's also a guy on eBay that makes caliper brackets for a number of popular axles, do a search by seller. His name is doug100. I think his brackets allow you to use large rotors...I also believe they allow you to use GM calipers, which is decent for parts availability. You might want to check it out.

 

[Jon Manning]

Are you sure that's a 8.8 that they been using, I've had 2 explorer's and they both had 3:55s locking rearend's but they were also dana 70 unit's. Just something to think about.

 

[hawkrod]

sorry jon, the explorer never came with a dana 70. the dana 70 is only used in f350 and larger trucks and it is huge (really huge, the ring gear is like 12 inches in diameter and 2 inches thick huge, racers don't even use them because they are too big!). all explorers come with 8.8's they never came with anything else. hawkrod

 

[Jon Manning]

Well Tom I'll diffinetly take your word on it, But the last time I was underneath the 91 I used to own it had a metal tag on it that did say dana 70 3:55 and some other codes. Kind of wish I still had it since I'm looking at about 6-7 in. of snow out the window. Have a good one and let me stand corrected. Jon

 

[radcat68]

I put a 95 Mustang GT 8.8 rear end with disc in my 68 Cougar. Go to radcat68.tripod.com go to gallery 1 and see the setup. Don't put the www in front of the site address. I'll post a pic of it in the car.

Radcat

 

[CrazyCat]

how does the entire width of the 8.8 compare to the stock 8 or 9" ?

 

[modifiedmark]

I'm backing hawkrod, they never used a dana 70 in an explorer. My F350 Crewcab dsl did have one. mm

 

[radcat68]

It's about an inch wider

 

[CrazyCat]

Hmmm... an inch wider ? Does that mean that you would now be able to fit the stock 94+ mustang wheels? (offset now being correct)

 

[radcat68]

The wheels will fit the rear, but if you have factory front disc the wheel will hit the caliper.

 

[radcat68]

Pic of 95 Mustang 8.8 rearend in 68 Cougar

 

[radcat68]

Pic 2 of rearend

 

[LIZARDKING]

I think the 8.8 out of a Ranger is almost a perfect fit. You still have to change the spring perch location. Most later 4X4 Rangers have a 8.8 trac loc with 3.55s or 3.73s. I got one from a salvage yard for 100$. The rear discs from a Crown Vic ran another 50$. I havent used it yet but it was a low mileage 8.8 and the price was right.

 

[dablack]

Wow, got some great ideas from all of this. Now I want to get a mustang rear so I can run mustang rims in the back w/ out spacers. I would still have to get the spacers for the front but thats not too bad.

RADCAT,
You are running 91 crown vic rims and a 8.8 from a mustang. So, how is that back spacing working out. I mean, if they fit the front wouldn't they be too wide for the rear and if they fit in the back then are you running spacers up front?

LIZARDKING,
Yeah, I think the explorer and ranger rears are the same width. I hadn't thought about the 4x4s. I bet they do have some good ratios.

 

[radcat68]

The wheel fit pretty good i'll post some pic of the wheels.
The Ranger rearend won't work well because one side is longer than the other. The ratios do very from 3.08 - 4.10 lock & non lock depending on application. I think the left side is long because of the gas tank.

 

[CrazyCat]

Radcat-
So what did you have to do to get the 8.8 to bolt up to the Cat.
Do you need to cut the spring perch off of the old rear end and weld to the 8.8? Any more details?

This swap seems to be a good idea, I'd bet you can find an entire assy and have it rebuilt for less than a rear disc upgrade.
Thanks.

 

[radcat68]

You can buy spring pearches at a performance shop for about $20. Get your pinon angle before you start it makes setting up the 8.8 alot easier. Click on the link below to see the rearend before I installed it in my cat.
http://radcat68.tripod.com/gallery1images/RAD23.JPG

 

[CrazyCat]

I see... It looks like you hacked off the mustang upper control arm mounts too.

 

[radcat68]

Cut all tha stuff off to have a more factory look.