Topic: New To The Site. Best Repro 1966 Drum Brake Parts?

[Birdstrike]

Hello everyone.  I'm a third generation owner of a 1966 289 San Jose built coupe.

My grandfather originally bought the car in Vacaville CA, drove it two years and then sold it to his oldest son (my uncle).  My uncle drove it around northern California until about 1985.  During the time he owned it the car was stolen from a parking lot, driven into the Sierra Nevada foothills on a lonely dirt road, and selective parts were removed.  It was recovered, rebuilt, and my uncle drove it a few more years until it was passed on to my cousins who promptly blew the engine. 

My dad and I received the car in 1986, rebuilt the engine, and drove I it through college and after for quite a few years adding another 100k + miles to it.  Since then it has been garage kept mostly in California, for a short time in Texas, and now resides with me in Anchorage, Alaska. 

The car is tired, has lived a good life, and now deserves to be restored.  I look back now and wish I had been more careful previously with part selection, cleaning, and repainting.  Hopefully I'll be able to correct my mistakes over the coming years.

The car is not quite road worthy right now and needs a rearend rebuild.  I've been gathering parts so that when the car goes into the local gear shop for the rearend rebuild I can replace the leaf springs, shocks, and rebuild the brakes.  I just ordered new drums, shoes, cylinders, and hardware kits from one of the big Mustang parts houses.  Although Raybestos parts, I was disappointed to see all of it was manufactured in China.  Are there better repro brake parts made in the US anymore?  Shipping costs are a problem for me living in AK so I'll probably just need to live with these parts for now.

My goal right now is to get the car back on the road.  After the rearend and rear suspension rebuild I need to move to the front suspension and have the carburetor rebuilt/replaced.  From there I can decide just how far I want to take the restoration.  I'd love to bring the car back to a Concourse Driven category but I don't know if the car is a good candidate for that or how much $ it would really take. More than I would guess probably?  Lol. I'm not sure if I want to tackle the restoration or send the car down to the lower 48 to a shop that specializes in early Mustangs.

I'm sure I'll have tons of questions and I appreciate all the work the mods have put into this site.

[67gtasanjose]

Welcome.

Nice looking Coupe. Awesome backdrop with the mountains

Your consideration to restore the car and how far you wish to go should be your choice. With that in mind, bear in mind the answers you will receive at this site tend to center around "concours" restoration, not general restoration. Since the car has been in the family so long, if it were me to offer an opinion, I would work along the lines of concours repair work I did on future work. You say you plan to drive it and brakes and drums can be easily upgraded in the future, should you wish to go up a rung or two from what you choose to do today. Body & paint work is where you wish to try and be strict as possible.
Also try avoiding the aftermarket upgrades if you can. Try to keep a mentality of an "undo button" for any changes and repairs so if you ever change to improve the restoration later on in life, it will be much easier.

Whenever possible, KEEP ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING KNOWN TO BE ORIGINAL TO THE CAR, EVEN IF IT LOOKS SHOT. That alone is the biggest mistake made during restoration, loosing track of "original" pieces.

Have fun, ask questions and good luck!

[J_Speegle]

Firstly - welcome to the site

......The car is not quite road worthy right now and needs a rearend rebuild.  I've been gathering parts so that when the car goes into the local gear shop for the rearend rebuild I can replace the leaf springs, shocks, and rebuild the brakes.  I just ordered new drums, shoes, cylinders, and hardware kits from one of the big Mustang parts houses.  Although Raybestos parts, I was disappointed to see all of it was manufactured in China.  Are there better repro brake parts made in the US anymore?  ....

Looks like your looking for replacement parts rather than reproductions since it will be difficult to see any of these internal parts once the car is together and I don't believe anyone is reproducing the brake shoes with the FoMoCo markings

With that said I'm unaware of any of the major makers of these parts having them made in the US. Be aware that your likely going to purchase wheel cylinders that have the larger (non-factory) size bleeders so that can be an issue.

I'm guessing that for the brake drums you've already measured them to make sure they need replacing. The replacements will likely look different from originals and you don't want to just throw parts at the project if you don't have to, though allot of home grown first timers will go that route. This can result in unhappy owners later when they find out that they need to replace the parts again if they really want a restored car.

Also I see you mentioned springs - please read the other threads related to refinishing and possibly combining part of the originals with the replacements if you choose that route.  Your springs might not need replacing - something else to consider

Just some thoughts to consider