my father just called me and said his friend is building a 40's dodge truck on an 03 dakota 2wd frame and wants to change it over to 5 lug. I know you can change the 2nd generation daks over to 5 lugs with a rotor swap but what about the 3rd generation?

Not that easy. It's been suggested to buy aftermarket hubs, plug weld the holes except one, and redrill to the 5 lug pattern. Then you redrill the rotor too. Using an earlier rotor is out as they are both smaller diameter and thinner.

R.

arent the newer dakotas now a wide 5 on 5.5---or see if the 1/2 ton dodge trucks use the same spindle as the 2002---it is way easier to drill new holes in virgin material than to weld shut then redrill through the hardened material...

Moser will do it for $90 per hub.

http://www.moserengineering.com/moser/shop-services/

Bad news for the home team, there seems to be three different setups. The early, both 5 and 6 lug, the middle, which the 2003 definitely is, and the late which is completely different, including all the 5 on 5 hubs.

The only good thing about the 2003 is that replacement hubs are like $40 each from Rockauto.

R.

So just wondering, can the early spindles that take the rotor be changed out with the later spindles that take the hub? The later upper control arms have bolt in ball joints, which are far easier to replace.