I'm an old Hot Rodder. Always looking for the next thing to move on to. OK, so I've got this First Gen Dodge Dakota (87-93) front suspension project and after some good beer searched the internet and came up with a plan for slightly bigger brakes. Goes like this:

Cut down the stock Dakota 5" x 4.5" disk brake rotors to take 98-02 Ford Crown Vic rotors. Use 95-00 Lexus LS400 aluminum four piston calipers and fab a bracket to hold it all together. Easy, yes? Well, not so bad so far. The Crown Vic rotor is 12.43" and 28.1mm wide. Near identical to a Lexus rotor. The whole shootin' match fits inside a 17" Mustang Bullitt wheel. So far I've got:

$120 machine rotors to hubs
$40 Lexus calipers from a boneyard(they are good!)
$100 Ford Crown Vic rotors
$22 Lexus brake pads

Under $300. I've got to fab the bracket still. Probably need a 1" spacer for the wheels because the caliper overhangs the rotor. Not a deal breaker. Can this be done for other setups? Probably, I'm only doing this one for the Dak.

That's pretty genius. But wait, did you machine the hubs or the rotors? Or both?

Machined the Dakota rotors as hubs to fit the Crown Vic stockers. No mods to the Crown Vic rotors.

The other part of this may be "can the 13" Mustang rotors also be used"? Answer is Yes, but. Yes, they will also work, but they have "less hat" than the Crown Vic rotors. That moves the caliper farther away from the steering knuckle and requires a thicker wheel spacer. So yeah, it can also work.

Ample clearance inside a 17" Mustang Bullitt wheel. The "hard" part will be fabbing the bracket.

Are longer wheel studs needed?

I think so. Depends if I can find the correct hub centric spacer at the right width. I'm winging it right now.

Oh, I forgot to mention. Lexus master cylinder bore size is listed at 1".

Hit a snag I should have caught. There's a small lip on the Dakota "hub" (formally rotor) that positions the Mopar wheel. It's larger than the opening on Ford wheels so I'll either take it back to the machinist to mill off ($60 an hour) or do it myself with a Dremel. That lip prevents the hub from fully seating in my Ford sized wheels.

Other thing of note. I've had in my stash a set of cruddy 2002 Toyota Tundra four pot SW13E calipers. Out of curiosity, I tried them on my setup. They fit GREAT! That's a problem.. They fit excellent and are inexpensive. However, they weigh about 14 lbs and are made of cast iron. The Lexus and Dakota calipers both weigh in at 7 lbs. The Tundra calipers are a snap to fabricate a bracket for but the Lexus calipers will take some work. Now I'm wondering if I should just push the "Easy Button".

Are you looking at this for some Dakota info or an FMJ? I have an F body front k member sitting in the garage.

Also, it looks like once I trim the hub down, I have adequate clearance and may not need spacers at all.

Geez that Dakota hub wheel face is Uber thick, does that take standard mopar/fmj wheel bearings ?? I plan on doing some thing similar with my volare, but I am using Mustang cobra rotors front and rear, and brembo 4 piston calipers front and 2 piston rear off a 2005 Mercedes clk500, I can't wait to see how this turns out, and I plan on upgrading to 18" wheels, but I am trying to stuff them inside 17" wheels also using large bolt pattern hubs from a mid 70s duster that had drums up front

out of curiosity, what diameter did you turn the dak hub to ? sorry if you said and i missed it.

I have a Volare front end in my garage. I'll see if I can pull the rotors off this weekend and let you know if the Dakota "hub" will fit the F body spindle.

Also, I think I mentioned that I see no problem with using this combo with 13" Cobra rotors other than it positions the caliper further away from the steering knuckle and MAY (or may not) require spacers.

Late edit:


Dak "hub" won't work on the FMJ. Dak spindle is bigger.

It's about 6 3/8" but that's imprecise. I took the Dakota and Ford rotor to the machinist. He did his magic and it came out pretty good with zero slop on the hub.

Now you got me thinking get if the Dakota spindle has the same dimensions as the fmj, but I believe the fmj is taller, I just rockauto searched and the ball joints are different, but with out physically measuring I wouldn't know the difference, looks like when I hit the junk yard today or tomorrow I'll see if I can find a fmjob to use as a test stand, and I know they have older Dakota state so this should be intresting

thank you.

I can tell you the Dakota spindle and the FMJ spindle are not close in dimensions. Dakota spindle is thicker. Dakota is front steer and FMJ is rear steer so the Dak hangs the caliper in the back while the FMJ hangs it in the front. That said, if you work with the FMJ stuff to try this you can really leave the Dakota parts out of the picture. If you hit the junkyard, grab a couple of nasty, rusty old FMJ brake rotors and a nasty, old 1998-2002 Crown Vic rotor AND hub. Oh, and while you're there, locate a couple of 95-00 LS400 calipers. See if you can get the shootin' match for under $60. After that, you're on your own!

Greg

A quick update and maybe you'll see something you didn't know. I picked up a 12" X 24" X 1\2" thick steel plate ($36) to fabricate the caliper mounting brackets. Made a cardboard template, then drew the outline on the steel plate. Dropped off the plate, template and spindles at the machinist. He'll get back to me fairly soon. In the meantime, my curiosity got the best of me about how this setup would work in other sized wheels. I know it works in 17" and 18" wheels, but what about 15" wheels? It so happens I have a set of 15" Mopar Cop Steelies sitting in the rafters so I got one down to check for a fit. Guess what? It sorta fits. Sorta? Well, when the Dakota hub, Crown Vic rotor and Lexus caliper are placed in the Mopar 15" wheel, the tapered portion of the rim fouls the caliper. BUT, if you run a 1\2" or 3\4" spacer, you've got all the clearance you'd need. So, that's the answer to the question nobody asked.

Nascar guys are running 12.12 inside 15" wheels. As you see, the wheel hoop and its related step downs is a big factor in fit.

hells yea, awesome update Greg, I can't wait to see more progress shots !!

-Mike