First thing's first, this post and the other one I'm about to post after it will likely be stupid question central since I'm not that mechanically knowledgable, so appologies in advance if my questions are hair-pullingly dumb, haha. So today I realized that one of my rarely looked-at(because it's mostly scrap and sitting out in the field) parts cars had front disc brakes, so I popped the hood(not that there's any actual popping since it doesn't latch) to take a look at the master cylinder and sure enough, there's a big old brake booster and shock tower brace that wraps around it to accomodate. Now my project Mav also has front disc brakes, but they're manual(I'm assuming here that brake booster means power brakes and no booster means manual brakes). The thing is the parts car doesn't have the rotors anymore and has been sitting on the axle and spindles with no wheels on, so I'm not sure if anything important is damaged or not down there. Anyway, my main question here is this: would it be worth swapping the manual disc brakes currently on my project for the power disc brakes from my parts car? Is there anything I'd need from the donor apart from the master cylinder itself and accomodating shock tower brace? I've read on here that a conversion from drums to discs requires different spindles, but would I need the donor's spindles for a manual disc to power disc swap? Here are a few pictures for reference. Project car's master cylinder. Parts car's master cylinder. And a couple pictures of the spindles on the parts car.
All you need is the booster, booster bracket, and pedal/pedal hanger. And off course the brace. No difference in spindles. I'm not certain about the master cylinder, biput don't think it is different between the two disc applications. Would you be interested in selling the spindles off your parts car? - Matt
Master cylinders between power disc and manual disc are different... Though main difference is the fitting size & pedal rod on the non power MC(that PB MC doesn't have)... Probably all you have that will be useable is the brace and under dash linkage, the MC is no doubt junk and booster probably(like 97%) needs rebuilding...
EIther stick with the manual brakes, or put an after market booster on there. The factory power brakes aren't all that great, and the swap is a real pain. Not to mention that booster and spring tower bracket are ugly. I have manual disc brakes and the car stops just fine.
If I'm recalling correctly there is some minor surgery on the firewall to go to power brakes. I helped a friend install them on his Maverick and once we had the old master off we had to open the firewall slightly. On the other hand I installed non-power discs on my Maverick (from drums) and it stops very well. Bruce
Thanks for all the advice, I'll just stick with manual brakes then, no point in going out of my way if what I have is good enough. Sure, but I've never shipped anything before so I don't really know how shipping works, haha. I'm also in Canada and you're in the US, so I'm not sure if that would complicate anything. How much would you be willing to take them for?
My Maverick was power disc, the Comet was manual drum. When the Maverick was wrecked I put the disc brakes on the Comet but kept it manual. Honestly I could not tell the difference between the power disc and the manual disc. Also, as Larry mentioned, Ford should have been embarrassed about the factory brake booster. It is a ridiculous thrown together solution. Should I ever decide to go back to power disc, I will not be using the factory booster, there are better smaller solutions available.
Yes, the Power setup on the Maverick was an "afterthought" (just like the big bumpers). They put a Ford Granada/Mercury Monarch power booster, which they obviously had to get creative to make fit in the Maverick.
Actually it's nowhere nearly as bizarre as the Mav setup, basically just angles booster & MC to left to clear engine...
Not to mention accessing the spark plugs is damned near impossible with the power setup. Which is why I converted mine right off the bat. (and cut the shock towers back as well)
