New FR500's 17x9's and 5 lug 4 wheel big disc conversion competed on my '86

[mdula]

Just got done after months of work converting the car to 5 lug 4 wheel disc. And FINALLY got to bolt on the new wheels and tires. I made the mistake in not putting on the front isolators so I'll be pulling the springs again tonight. I dont hear any road noise with them removed or anything, its just too low in the front. A little more of a rake than I wanted.

Also the brakes feel a little too stiff for me, after all this I'd expect it to stop a little better. I know the brakes need bedded in but I need to check my brake booster because it feels like it might not be functioning, or I have the wrong MC in the car.

So just finished all this work:

17x9 SVE FR500 on all 4
245/45/17 front Nitto 555 G2
275/40/17 rear Nitto 555 G2

Replaced rear alxe 8.8 3.73 LS
1" cobra MC
sn95 spindles
SVE Lowering springs
SVE cobra style calipers
StopTech rotors
Tubular upper and lower control arms
All braided lines
moog sn95 ball joints
new struts / shocks

[mdula]

Before:

[86FOX4EYE]

Nice Job. What front LCA's did you use? Have you had a chance to align it yet? Looks really good.

Matthew

[JKengineering]

Boy that looks good!
Mike

[84StangSVT]

Looks great! I love those wheels on our cars. They just look right.

[mdula]

Nice Job. What front LCA's did you use? Have you had a chance to align it yet? Looks really good.

Matthew

I used these Control Arms Ford Mustang Rear Upper and Lower Control Arm Full Kit (Blk) High Quality https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00D0I3NDU..._qjkR4dkeNyxtd

Seem okay. Yet to really drive it, it needs aligned and i plan to pull the front springs to add isolators.

[mdula]

Thanks guys, I think they good great on early fox's as well. One of the few modern wheels I think fir the look of the ca and show off the brakes nicely.

[Dr. Matt]

Looks great!

[mdula]

Nice Job. What front LCA's did you use? Have you had a chance to align it yet? Looks really good.

Matthew

Man, I cant read...Just saw you said front. Front control arms are stock.

[86FOX4EYE]

10-4. Thanks. I am interested in how the camber works out. I am working on the same changes myself.

Matthew

[2nd chance cobra]

I'm ALL sn95 front. I have seen a few sets of those wheels pop up on c list, and haven't popped on them for fear of rubbing. I'm stock height too

[Mighty Mouse]

Normally i'm not a fan of those wheels but wow they look really good on this car!

[supercharged347]

Great choice in wheels. Looks awesome. I am running the 17x9 with 235/45zr17 up front and the 18x10 with 285/35zr18.

[tORMENtOR]

Looks so much better with the FR500's then the Ponys.

[wraithracing]

Nice looking Mustang!

As for your brake issues, the 93 Cobra MC is most likely the issue. I have the same MC as well as the 93 Cobra booster in my 79 PC with 03/04 Cobra brakes front and rear. The pedal is hard with little or not feeling or modulation. Booster works just fine and has plenty of vacuum. The hard/short pedal is due to the 1" bore of the 93 Cobra M/C. When I get around to refreshing my 79 PC I plan to swap it out for either a stock Fox 22mm M/C or the 94/95 15/16" Cobra M/C.

[mdula]

Thanks all. Im pretty excited. Looks better than I expected, in my opinion.

[mdula]

Nice looking Mustang!

As for your brake issues, the 93 Cobra MC is most likely the issue. I have the same MC as well as the 93 Cobra booster in my 79 PC with 03/04 Cobra brakes front and rear. The pedal is hard with little or not feeling or modulation. Booster works just fine and has plenty of vacuum. The hard/short pedal is due to the 1" bore of the 93 Cobra M/C. When I get around to refreshing my 79 PC I plan to swap it out for either a stock Fox 22mm M/C or the 94/95 15/16" Cobra M/C.

Man,good to know someone with a silimar setup is having similar issues. I know the brakes need bedded but I can tell that the pedal is hard and only moves about an inch or so. I tested my booster tonight and its fine, so it almost has to me the mc. I have the stock 86 MC I'm almost tempted to try. Its odd that all the sites and reading I did all recommended the 1" bore with the pbr fronts / cobra rear. The all braided lines Im sure dont help. I also have a 1-1/16" bore that I "was" going to use before ordering the 1", glad I didnt use it, it would have been worse. I did read up and thought maybe my booster was too small, but glad you mentioned this now.

[danco86]

First off, I love the fr500's on these cars. I had a set of anthracite grey ones for my '86, but when I did my brake conversion I used '87-93 spindles, so the hub was too long and large to fit the wheels. My bad for not going sn95 like originally planned. I have the same caliper setup as you, but on 13" discs. I used a 15/16" MC and my pedal feels good.
I noticed on your car the rear calipers are positioned down low. What mounting bracket did you use to position them there? I want to install a panhard bar but the location of my rear calipers won't allow for it.

That is an awesome looking car with sweet mods, and we have identical F150's too.
Thumbs up from me

[mdula]

First off, I love the fr500's on these cars. I had a set of anthracite grey ones for my '86, but when I did my brake conversion I used '87-93 spindles, so the hub was too long and large to fit the wheels. My bad for not going sn95 like originally planned. I have the same caliper setup as you, but on 13" discs. I used a 15/16" MC and my pedal feels good.
I noticed on your car the rear calipers are positioned down low. What mounting bracket did you use to position them there? I want to install a panhard bar but the location of my rear calipers won't allow for it.

That is an awesome looking car with sweet mods, and we have identical F150's too.
Thumbs up from me

Nice! Have a blue flame F150? Love this color and would love to paint the mustang blue flame. The rear set a is kit, odd kit, I've never seen before. They are low but the bleeder is straight up. The axle I found online with the 5 lug and rear conversion already done, looks to have GM "metric" style calipers with integrated parking brake and uses 11" front mustang rotors. The car that axle came off of also had a panhard bar kit, so maybe this was a custom setup to allow for it??

[erratic50]

Like the end result. When you go to align your car you will likely need camber bolts to achieve the necessary amounts of negative camber. The most I could get without camber bolts on my 1986 with sn95 spindles and stock K member and stock A arms and X2 ball joints was +2 degrees. Unacceptable plus with the struts tipped all the way in there was no available caster adjustment. Worse yet the tires rubbed terribly when turning.

With camber bolts my 17"x8" rims with 245/45/17 tires on 1995 tribar rims fit and function very well. All I needed to do was get my fender wells up out of the way and screwed in well.

I run around 1.5" of drop in front due to caster/camber plates and X2 ball joints.

[danco86]

Yessir. That flame blue metallic is a winning color. I wasn't even in the market for a new truck when I came across that one at the Ford dealer. I can't think of any other time where I'd seen a vehicle once and knew I had to have it.

But yeah, maybe that is the reason your calipers aa located where they are. It is where I was told I'd have to move mine to, if I wanted to install the bar.

I strongly encourage you to paint it flame blue. I've always wanted to see a fox in that color.

[86FOX4EYE]

Yessir. That flame blue metallic is a winning color. I wasn't even in the market for a new truck when I came across that one at the Ford dealer. I can't think of any other time where I'd seen a vehicle once and knew I had to have it.

But yeah, maybe that is the reason your calipers aa located where they are. It is where I was told I'd have to move mine to, if I wanted to install the bar.

I strongly encourage you to paint it flame blue. I've always wanted to see a fox in that color.

Dan,
Have you checked with other manufacturers on your track bar (panhard) fitting issue? It sounds a bit unusual to me but maybe I am wrong. At any rate if you can't find a kit that will clear the brakes, track bars are fairly easy the fabricate for a competent welder and work well as long as you get the math right. That is fairly simple too. Track bar design principles are well documented in many books.

Here is one book.
http://books.sae.org/r-146/

Sorry, Not trying to hijack the thread.

Matthew

[Jack Hidley]

Properly bed the pads to the rotors before you make any decisions on changing the m/c.

If the car does have some type of GM "metric" caliper, these things are generally huge and the 1" m/c is the best choice. Step one is to find out what the diameter of the rear caliper piston is. After the pads are all bed in, test the brakes to see if the fronts or rears lock up first. If it is the rears, you will definitely need to disable the stock proportioning valve and install an adjustable valve.

[Supersonic G.T.350]

Looks smoking man! I'm a fan of FR500's!

[mdula]

Like the end result. When you go to align your car you will likely need camber bolts to achieve the necessary amounts of negative camber. The most I could get without camber bolts on my 1986 with sn95 spindles and stock K member and stock A arms and X2 ball joints was +2 degrees. Unacceptable plus with the struts tipped all the way in there was no available caster adjustment. Worse yet the tires rubbed terribly when turning.

With camber bolts my 17"x8" rims with 245/45/17 tires on 1995 tribar rims fit and function very well. All I needed to do was get my fender wells up out of the way and screwed in well.

I run around 1.5" of drop in front due to caster/camber plates and X2 ball joints.

Great lol.

So, Ive official removed the front end on this car 3 or 4 times. I did it all last night again just to put in the spring isolators. Leaving them out was a bad idea lol, car is way too low. Its much better now but those springs are a HUGE PITA to put in. Good to know though, very good to know. You suspect that the camber bolts are a "weak spot"? Im going to try to get it aligned today or tomorrow (soon as I can). And hope that they can get it close. Judging by eye the passenger side is negative camber right now, but the driver is positive, still a little room on the CC plates for adjustments, but not much. I also suspect I will be needing a bump-steer kit as well. My car as well was lowered about 1.5. The SVE springs up front, the car measures exactly 25.5 inches from the ground to the fender opening.