hello buickfriends, i was wondering if anyone has changed, discbrakes for drums on 62 lesabre. are there interchangable parts to find for this car that are not so hard to convert. i'm asking this because my car drive great but stopping power just isn't enough in the heavy traffic in holland. ps mij car is powered by a 68 430 buick, wich almost runs great, still needs some fine tuning Vince
Vince, try http://www.scarebird.com , he makes a kit for installing front disks from mid-70's full-size Buicks on our cars. I plan on using this kit on my 62 Electra when I have the time and money. Brian
Other disc conversions. I have a 66 Riveria driver and have been shopping around for disc conversions front and rear for about a year. There are lots of ways to spend alot of money and I was about to drop $ 1600 as well on the RSS kit out of Austrialia for just the front. This was the only one I could find that would fit the 66' without changing the 5 x 5 pattern. I looked into the Scarebird option and that is probably the lowest cost alternative especially if you have a good shop and source for the other needed parts. Also, I called ECI (http://www.ecihotrodbrakes.com/) and they don't have Riviera but did give me the number of a guy in Charlotte, NC that does one off kits for absolutley anything. His site is http://www.braketechsolutions.com/ I drove down there this week (2 hours away) and talked to him for a couple of hours and it was worth the trip. I would have to say this was the way to go for me. The owner does much of the prototype and patent design for some of the larger custom manufactures and has already developed the cad templates for the Riviera and just about every rare car I could imagine. He had a very clean and professional shop deticated to just this type of project. I left him my spindles and rear axle flanges and in two weeks I will be picking up a my kit to have complete 4 wheel disc on a 66' Riviera. He uses all new off the shelf items that are common heavy duty chevy full-size & Caddy parts with adapter plates similar to the Scarebird option. He lists the kits for $995 for the front and $795 for the rear and that is completely assembled in front on my spindle with new bearings, hubs, discs, calipers and rotors. The rear is a bolt-on complete kit with all new parts and includes emergency brake and cables. And to my knowledge, this is the only shop I could find that has experience setting up rear 11" disc on that style (12 bolt non c-clamp) Buick axle. I will be starting a new thread here on the complete conversion with pictures and directions so we can all see how this works out. I am certainly looking forward to the swap and it seems to be one of the most complete and easy to maintain swaps, especially for daily use.
Doug, check out this thread.. http://www.v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=86649 I posted some pictures from my scarebird conversion
Disc Conversion Almost Done Just wanted to update on the disc conversion..... I picked up the parts from Brake Tech Solutions in Charlotte this Wednesday and with 2 days of work I have front and rear disc on the 66 Riviera with no real headaches. Overall, it was a very easy swap with no problems. The only real worry I had was with the factory 15" rally wheels, but they fit fine on both front and rear.
Riviera disk brake conversion... Great looking Riviera in your avatar! Let's see some of those pictures of the conversion soon. I am also looking into a 4 wheel disc conversion on my 67', although I want to use 17" rims so I can get 13" discs inside of them. Brakes are the weakest thing on the 66-67 Rivieras, and I want all the stopping power I can get. Later, Randy
