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The street rod guys have had 9" IRS setups for years...but they are pricy. Heidt's etc?
I've got a Dana 60 housing from a Hemi car made into an IRS under mine. Took a little fab work to install but it's been there for many years without touching it.
JIM
And if anyone puts the power down without breaking it's Jim.
The street rod guys have had 9" IRS setups for years...but they are pricy. Heidt's etc?
I've got a Dana 60 housing from a Hemi car made into an IRS under mine. Took a little fab work to install but it's been there for many years without touching it.
The street rod guys have had 9" IRS setups for years...but they are pricy. Heidt's etc?
I've got a Dana 60 housing from a Hemi car made into an IRS under mine. Took a little fab work to install but it's been there for many years without touching it.
JIM
Jim, isn't a Dana 60 what John Lingenfelter used to build his IRS back in the early 70's to set so many NHRA records with his Big Block Corvette? As I recall, he convinced them to let him run it in Stock/Super Stock for safety reasons.
Gusto....Wow...you've got a memory! Yep...John was one of the ones using them. He had 14x32's stuffed under there with super short halfshafts.
You can see in the pics how a Dana 60 compares to a Vette diff. Vette's have an 8.2" ring gear. Then there are the 8-7/8" of a 12 bolt, an 8-3/4" Mopar, a 9" Ford and then the Dana 60 with a 9.75" one.
There were several folks making the conversions in the 70's. Most used a Hemi housing because it had a provision for a pinion snubber and it made it easier to fab a front mount. While searching around for info I found Tom's had one on the shelf they had bought to study from someone but had decided to not market them. He wasn't willing to let it go. A guy I know found one at a garage sale in the Carolina's somewhere. I had seen pics of them in the magazines and was determined to get my hands on one.
Most had spools in them like in the bottom two pics. We bought this one from a Super Stock racer who had converted to a solid axle (and went slower!). It had 4.88 gears in it and used a monster steel rear cover to mount it. We had Mike Dyer (Traccdog) freshen it up. It was later sold to a fellow in Arkansas along with a 632" engine we had.
The top 2 pics are under my car. I had a computer crash years ago and lost the internal shots of it and I haven't had to go back in there in all this time (which is a good thing!). If you look closely you can see the 3/4" aluminum adapter plate between the stock cover and the housing. I sectioned the sombrero crossmember in the center and scooted it back the 3/4". I also added a "wing" to extend under that stationary crossmember that is just sitting there doing nothing. When the rear tries to pivot upwards on acceleration it adds some support to keep it in place. The yokes are Spicer truck pieces and are held to the inner axles with big nuts. I made a front mount and when all done it bolts to stock Vette mounting points.
Mine was made from a NOS Hemi housing that never had axle tubes pressed in it. It was a leftover from early 70's Pro Stock days. It uses a special Posi unit that was also a leftover from those days. Apparently axle science/metallurgy wasn't what it is today and some racers weren't too thrilled to have an axle break with a spool (which can push you into a wall). If you were sponsored by Mopar they had these units. The only thing I could tell different is the cross shaft is larger on the spiders and they said the gears were heat treated differently.
It has 1480 series U-joints with Tom's outer stub axles. Halfshafts are 3.5"x.134 wall.
It has 3.07 gears for highway and top end running which took some work to fit because they don't make them for a Dana 60..only a Dana 61.
It's old school and heavy as heck...but so far so good!
Jim, thanks so much for posting the pictures. I don't remember seeing pictures of John's set up back then, so I've always wondered just what all was involved in making a Dana 60 into an IRS.
I good friend was running a '66 Corvette in C/MP back in the very early 70's and he sent his car to Grumpy in Malvern PA to have a Dana 60 straight axle put in it. Having seen that, it was difficult to imagine turning one into an IRS and fitting it into the back of the Corvette.
First batch of parts arrived today. The C7 hubs are a beefy piece. 33 spline, with a nice machined back to register in the trailer arm. Will have to build a carrier for the hub to register against.
I'm am following this thread and hope you are successful in the build for around $3,000.00 as I will be doing something similar in the near future.
Thanks for posting this.
I'm am following this thread and hope you are successful in the build for around $3,000.00 as I will be doing something similar in the near future.
Thanks for posting this.
Definitely interested in this. Recently found out the diff I have is not a posi. If I'm going to fall into the "while you're in there" trap to convert it to a posi, I may as well do it right the first time...
Keep us updated please! Part numbers and other details of what you used would be fantastic too if you're willing to share. Thanks!
Just to do a quick recap on the concept, parts and prototyping Lance (HiltonLo) is showing us:
2015 and up Mustang IRS differential + 2014 and up (C7) corvette rear hubs + custom made CV Axles built by Drive shaft shop or similar vendor.
All this should put together a very strong and reliable and perfectly streetable IRS combo to handle 1000 hp or possibly better, for under 3 grand, as long as your able to do your own fab work, at least until someone takes this concept and markets a bolt in kit for the C3 community.
Just to do a quick recap on the concept, parts and prototyping Lance (HiltonLo) is showing us:
2015 and up Mustang IRS differential + 2014 and up (C7) corvette rear hubs + custom made CV Axles built by Drive shaft shop or similar vendor.
All this should put together a very strong and reliable and perfectly streetable IRS combo to handle 1000 hp or possibly better, for under 3 grand, as long as your able to do your own fab work, at least until someone takes this concept and markets a bolt in kit for the C3 community.
Someone could stand to have a good side business if they could put together an affordable bolt-in setup for a C3. With more and more C3 owners looking for more power (heck LS swaps are EVERYWHERE) now, a lot of them need a diff that can handle a bit more power. $3,000 for a bullet proof setup would be tempting,
I've always wondered why there isn't a hub & CV shaft rear setup for a C3. This will be interesting to watch and see how it progresses.
Originally Posted by mobird
Someone could stand to have a good side business if they could put together an affordable bolt-in setup for a C3. With more and more C3 owners looking for more power (heck LS swaps are EVERYWHERE) now, a lot of them need a diff that can handle a bit more power. $3,000 for a bullet proof setup would be tempting,
If the parts being discussed here are $3k then a whole kit would have to sell for something like $7k. It would include the custom diff mounting, new upper links and most likely complete rear trailing arms. Don't forget the instructions and support. Then, I'm doubtful the diff can be made to simply bolt-in without some work being done on the car to make it fit so it's not likely to be a bolt-in/bolt-on mod.
Also bear in mind, the 3k budget is using brand new off the shelf parts, there is money to be saved going used parts. Just a quick look on Ebay shows plenty of 2015 or newer mustang 8.8 diffs selling for 400-500. There are also damaged aluminum diffs selling in the 150-175 buck range. the damage is the forward ears had broken off, this apparently happens when they wheel hop bad. It is looking like the forward ears need to be cut off the diff anyway to give battery and storage box clearance. either new holes will be drilled and tapped in board of the ears where there is plenty of material or a collar clamp will be made on the pinion support as the forward mount point.
the next big part of the budget is the custom CV axles. those are quoted around 1300 bucks. I wonder if it is possible to get a hold of a used set of stock c7 vette axles and a used set of mustang axles and swap the ends and shorten up the intermediate axle. this could potentially save several hundreds if not a thousand bucks.
Can the rear use an adaptor plate to bolt the standard rear cover, the same as Jims Dana 60 install? Gives you your leaf spring and crossmember mounts easily, even if you have to modify the crossmember to locate it correctly. With that and drilling and tapping the front ears it should be pretty easily mounted. Then you just need inner and outer upper arm mounts. And of course you need to mount the hubs, but again that looks reasonably easy, hardest part looks like it will be making a flat pad on the trailing arms to mount the hubs to. I just might start buying some of these bits myself...
JoeC427....your ignorance and hate is astounding. first of all C7 hubs use 33 splined axles..did you know your beloved Toms outer axles are only 31 splines? second, The ford 8.8 differential have used in multitudes of fox body mustangs and are probably the most common differential used under stock suspension builds, with upgrades they are proven repetably and reliably under 1.10 60ft full weight cars. it is an excellent differential platform to build on with out tons of excess weight. next the axle set up is the same axle size and alloy that mark carlyle uses in his atomic fusion Zo6 going 6.80s with....so please go away or sit back and watch getting proven wrong.
11-29-2017, 09:31 AM
