Closest would be 57-59 Full size or 75-80 Granada. They are bolt in, but are slightly wider. Other rears that are direct bolt in would be: 67-70 Stang/Cougar. They are significantly wider though. Requiring more backspace on the rims to get them back under the car. 71-73 Stangs will bolt in too, but they require ridiculous backspace due to great width. They would take a late model Stang rim with no problem or spacers. The late Stangs have something close to 7" backspace, and that is what you need to tuck the tires with one of those 71-73 monsters. 65-66 HiPo Stang (K-code... or Shelby) 9" rears will work too. However they are valuable and you probably won't find one laying around. That said, Ford and Shelby made the 9" rears for those 2 years by grafting them into the stock 8" rears. They took the center out of the 8" rear housing and replaced it with a 9" housing center. The 8" used the same 28 spline axles and small bearing tubes, so it all hybrid together nicely. If you have a stock 5 lug 8" rear, you can get a 9" housing from any cheap/free donor and graft it into your 8" for not much dough. Costs around 200 bux in my town. Then you have a ready to bolt in 28 spline 9" rear, no narrowing or resplining. No getting new rims with more backspacing either. Good luck Dave
Last but not least is the 75-80 Lincoln Versailles. 1" wider than the 65-66 Stang rear. All the Versailles had the 9", it was optional in the same year's Monarch and Granada.
It's near the same width, but the pinion is offset 4" to the passenger side. You can use an Explorer 8.8 and narrow one side and then relocate the spring perches. I know some have done this in the Classic Stangs, but don't recall what the finished dimensions were. The Explorer rears are prefered over the Ranger rears due to they have 31 spline axles (ranger's are 28's) and many have posi units and some have disc brakes. Ratios run from 3.08 to 4.11
8.8s suck! well sort of...i dont like the c clip rears i have a 57 ford fairlane 500 9inch in my car and yes bolted right in with out an issue
The C-clips aren't an issue if you narrow both sides, you can replace the axle housing ends with 9" style and eliminate the C-clips. This is what I did with the Exploder rear in my Ranger.
