Get maverick disc brake asseblies from a maverick or a late 70s granada. this includes the spindle the caliper and ll the caliper clips that hold it in place and one bolt on each side. Hammer off the spindle from the ball joints and tie rod ends from your car and replace it with the new spindle and buy yourself new tie rod ends from the car that you took the spindles. Put everything back together like it was on the car you got the discs from and blamo. You dont NEED the prop valve and the master cylinder, but if you need piece of mind you can swap those too. I may not have been perfectly clear, so go to www.maverickgrabber.com for an in-depth detailed set of instructions for this swap. I believe it is under the mav/comet technical section. -Todd
just a thought You don't "need" to replace the tie rod ends if you don't want. At least I didn't, I didn't even have to get the front end checked out, it drives strait and true. The reason I say this is, if you change your tie rod ends you will probably want to have an allingment done.
This is what I learned doing my conversion. I have a 70, actually a 69.5 so I don't know if this is unique to my conversion or not. I bought a 77 donor car and got the complete spindle assemblies from both sides. I bought new rotors, calipers and a disc brake master cylinder. I finally got my brakes working good and I'm using the original distribution block. I did have to change my tie rod ends because the 70 tie rod ends went too deep into the spindle holes and would not have enough travel, I was afraid they would bind, so I got the 77 tie rod ends. I asked for help on this board on the brake lines and I ordered what was recommended, not these peoples fault, but they were too short by about 1 1/2 to 2". So I tried the original rubber lines and they were the same wrong length. I ended up ordering lines direct from Earls to the length I needed and they were cheaper by $20 than the russels. Anyways I think the early cars had longer flexible lines and I don't have clue when that might have changed. I know this is long but if I can save some one some trouble it is worth it to me.
hard to say it's always little things that we seem to run into on these cars, the engeneers at Ford like to change things for no good reason, job security I'm sure. I used the front brakes lines that were the Granada/Lincoln Versilles part number and they worked. A lot of it is trial and error. Russ Martin gave me a lot of advice on my car, he was a mechanic for over 30yrs and has done all these conversons on his '70.
Having done this conversion twice, the 70(also 69.5) the tie rods are too tall. The 72 and later tie rods from drum brakes are skinnier than stock disc tie rods. If the tie rods in your car fit very snugly(i.e. you cant push them in with your hands) in the disc spindle but the threads go up too high, to save your self some cash and an alignment, you could use a thick washer that barely gets around the threads to make the codder pin fit into the grooves of the nut on the tie rod. If you can push them in with your hands, get tie rods from the year of the car you got the spindles. This is the way to have 100% certain safe tie rods in your car when you do the disc swap. If you need piece of mind, go to Charlie Ping's site,(maverickgrabber.com) and read it for yourself. You dont really want to cheap out with your car when it comes to steering or braking. I personally would not cheap out and I would get new tie rods. Besides, you have to remember that they are more than thirty years old and they are going to crap out sometime. Sorry so long. -Todd
When I did my 72 Sprint, and another 71, the tie rods fit perfectly and I had no problem using the standard disc brake hose for a Maverick application. As Ward said, there may be a difference in the 70's only. I also used Maverick spindles. Is there a difference in the Granada spindles?
don't think so. I think the Maverick and Granada spindles are the same, they seem to interchange with a lot of cars. I know a guy who used the Granada conversion on his '70 Torino, I think maybe that is one design that the engineers didn't change much over those years.
