Need some electrical help with my ‘68 Plymouth Valiant 100
If you ask, "Should I order another drink?" you'll get a very different answer at the bar than you'll get at the AA meeting.
Second, my answer, which may not be the same as other people's answers:
When starting a car project, it is a good idea to define what you want to get out of it / what you want to do to it / what you want to wind up with in the end, and how much of it you intend to do yourself versus how much you will need to pay someone else to do.
You can do it without considering these things, and your answers may change over months / years / decades, but you need to have a sense of where you want to go and how you intend to get there.
Some people can't do anything, and the one tool they own is a checkbook.
Some people have one thing they can't do. They have no aptitude for electrical, or they can't paint, or upholstery makes them scream and throw things.
Some people do every freakin' thing, and if they can't they learn how and buy the tools for the job.
You need to have a sense of that before you really start anything.
So, are disk brakes better?
Yeah, sure, in an absolute sense, definitely.
They require less maintenance, don't go out of adjustment, are easier to modulate, are less prone to fade with heat (towing downhill on mountain roads, or racing, for instance), and can be used with ABS systems.
Is that really your question?
Or did you really want to ask, "Are disk brakes better for me, in my application, with my kind of driving, with my skill set, and with my financial constraints?"
Of course, only you can answer that.
The easiest, simplest, least physically taxing, cheapest, most conservative thing you can do is to get the brake system you have working properly, drive around with it, and decide whether it makes you happy.
If not, you can do a hell of a lot of reading and asking questions, then collect a fairly large pile of metal, then take a whole lot of stuff apart, then put a whole lot of stuff together, then spend a bunch or time working the bugs out of it, and getting your front/rear balance and your pressure delay correct.
But first, you need to check to see what, if anything, is wrong with your current brakes.
You need to jack up the back of the car, place your jackstands (jack it on the differential and place jackstands on the axle if you want the axle to sit high / on the unibody frame members if you want the axle to hang low), remove the wheels, remove the drums (maybe they'll just slide off, maybe you'll need to use a screwdriver and a brake spoon to back off the adjusters, maybe they'll be rusted to the axle shafts and you'll need a brake drum puller, or just a big sledgehammer), and look at the brakes to see whether they are worn out, whether the adjusters are working (broken cables, frozen screws, etc.), and whether the wheel cylinders are leaking.
Like I said elsewhere, just buy a spring kit and an adjuster kit to have on hand, because they're cheap.
It's also a good idea to get a proper brake spring tool (yard sales are the best source of nearly everything in the universe), because fighting with them like nearly every yahoo on YouTube seems to do is just dumb.
It would be good to have a couple of cans of REAL Brākleen (the stuff that smells sweet). It's not cheap and it goes fast (here again, flea markets and yard sales are your friend – I bought a box of about 15 cans, with broken-off spray nozzles, for ten bucks last month).
[Note that there is some evidence that this stuff could actually be bad for you, in decent quantities, so it's reasonable to minimize skin contact, which none of us ever did back in the "old days"].
Once you know what you've got, and you've seen a bit of what you need to do to fix it, you'll have a better idea of where you want to go with it.
– Eric
Brake spring tools (everyone has his preference):
First, allow me to point out the obvious fact that you are asking this question in a forum full of people who have spent tens of thousands of dollars installing freshly rebuilt 383s, 440s, and 426 Hemis, and completely re-engineered suspension systems, into what were once, mostly, granny cars.
If you ask, "Should I order another drink?" you'll get a very different answer at the bar than you'll get at the AA meeting.
Second, my answer, which may not be the same as other people's answers:
When starting a car project, it is a good idea to define what you want to get out of it / what you want to do to it / what you want to wind up with in the end, and how much of it you intend to do yourself versus how much you will need to pay someone else to do.
You can do it without considering these things, and your answers may change over months / years / decades, but you need to have a sense of where you want to go and how you intend to get there.
Some people can't do anything, and the one tool they own is a checkbook.
Some people have one thing they can't do. They have no aptitude for electrical, or they can't paint, or upholstery makes them scream and throw things.
Some people do every freakin' thing, and if they can't they learn how and buy the tools for the job.
You need to have a sense of that before you really start anything.
So, are disk brakes better?
Yeah, sure, in an absolute sense, definitely.
They require less maintenance, don't go out of adjustment, are easier to modulate, are less prone to fade with heat (towing downhill on mountain roads, or racing, for instance), and can be used with ABS systems.
Is that really your question?
Or did you really want to ask, "Are disk brakes better for me, in my application, with my kind of driving, with my skill set, and with my financial constraints?"
Of course, only you can answer that.
The easiest, simplest, least physically taxing, cheapest, most conservative thing you can do is to get the brake system you have working properly, drive around with it, and decide whether it makes you happy.
If not, you can do a hell of a lot of reading and asking questions, then collect a fairly large pile of metal, then take a whole lot of stuff apart, then put a whole lot of stuff together, then spend a bunch or time working the bugs out of it, and getting your front/rear balance and your pressure delay correct.
But first, you need to check to see what, if anything, is wrong with your current brakes.
You need to jack up the back of the car, place your jackstands (jack it on the differential and place jackstands on the axle if you want the axle to sit high / on the unibody frame members if you want the axle to hang low), remove the wheels, remove the drums (maybe they'll just slide off, maybe you'll need to use a screwdriver and a brake spoon to back off the adjusters, maybe they'll be rusted to the axle shafts and you'll need a brake drum puller, or just a big sledgehammer), and look at the brakes to see whether they are worn out, whether the adjusters are working (broken cables, frozen screws, etc.), and whether the wheel cylinders are leaking.
Like I said elsewhere, just buy a spring kit and an adjuster kit to have on hand, because they're cheap.
It's also a good idea to get a proper brake spring tool (yard sales are the best source of nearly everything in the universe), because fighting with them like nearly every yahoo on YouTube seems to do is just dumb.
It would be good to have a couple of cans of REAL Brākleen (the stuff that smells sweet). It's not cheap and it goes fast (here again, flea markets and yard sales are your friend – I bought a box of about 15 cans, with broken-off spray nozzles, for ten bucks last month).
[Note that there is some evidence that this stuff could actually be bad for you, in decent quantities, so it's reasonable to minimize skin contact, which none of us ever did back in the "old days"].
Once you know what you've got, and you've seen a bit of what you need to do to fix it, you'll have a better idea of where you want to go with it.
– Eric
Brake spring tools (everyone has his preference):