Inliners International Forums General Discussion Drive Train '80 Camaro Rear End

I'm planning on doing a T5 swap on my 53 Chevy and I have a chance to get the rear end out of a 80 Camaro. I've heard that these rear ends are a choice for the swap. Anyone else have an opinion on this? Also, what is a good price for these rear ends?

Thanks,

Josh

Dear Josh;

I don't think the bolt patterns are the same for the wheels. Plus you will have to re-locate the spring perchs & maybe the shock mounts.

A 53 is an 'open drive' I think so why not, stick with it??

John M.......

John,

I'm pretty sure that my 53 is a torque tube setup. It certainly looks like one.

I am aware of the shock mounts and spring perches, but I've never heard about the bolt hole differences. I'll have to check into that.

Josh

Are you talking about car or pickup? If it a car, it is a closed drive shaft. This is the swap I'd like to do in a year or two. I talked to the guy at Buffalo enterprises, their web site is pretty short, as is their cataloge, but they have all the stuff you'll need. When I called him, He went into great detail of how to do it and every thing. Very knowledgeable. I'd give him a call at 360-652-7684. He says this is a common and easy swap with good city and not bad highway running speeds if you get the right combo of gears and gearing. Check with him, super friendly and easy to talk to.

I guess I should have specified. Yeah, I'm talking about a car. I'll have to give Buffalo a call and see what he has to say. Thanks for the tip.

Josh

Let me know how things go, and if you've got a digital camera, take lots of photos. Hopefully you'll be able to guide me through this conversion when I'm ready to switch over my 53. By the way I've been told the S-10 rear ends are really good. I did a search on this board a while ago, and afew other people did rear end swaps in 53/54 cars. You might want to review some of the old posts.

Let me know how things go, and if you've got a digital camera, take lots of photos. Hopefully you'll be able to guide me through this conversion when I'm ready to switch over my 53. By the way I've been told the S-10 rear ends are really good. I did a search on this board a while ago, and afew other people did rear end swaps in 53/54 cars. You might want to review some of the old posts.

54 and earlier cars and 1/2 ton trucks are enclosed driveshafts.

49 and up cars are 5 lug 4 3/4" bolt pattern. So are S10's.

I believe that Camaro is going to be a little too wide. 55-64 car, 4X4 S10's, 68-75 Nova's, 67-69 Camaro's are the typical swap choices, but others will work also. Measure to be sure. Make sure you get something with an appropriate gear ratio for how you want to use the car. Also, rim selection is important. If you are planning on using different rims in the future, you will want to know what the backset is going to be so you get a rearend that will work without being too wide or too narrow.

You will need to change the bellhousing if using a tranny thats '55 or newer from a car, or '48 or newer from a truck. that means motor mounts, bellhousing, clutch linkage, crossmember, emergency brake, etc.. will also need to be redone for that T5 swap. Possibly floor pan mods also. T5's are toploaders, so the column shift is history.

I'm a little confused on the whole bellhousing thing. The car is a '53 but I have two engines for it. The one that is in it now is a 235 out of a '59 and the other one is a 235 out of a '60. I'm planning on rebuilding the '60 with some performace goodies and then swapping the engine, tranny, rearend, etc. So, with that said, what concerns would I have with the bellhousing, etc?

What I'm saying is that the '53 bellhousing wouldn't work with the later tranny. If you got a bellhousing with the '59 or '60 engine, then use that. Mounts and the clutch fork angle will be concerns still.

If the car has a '59 engine in it, but it still uses the enclosed driveline, then it would have to still be using the '53 stuff from the bellhousing back because when they switched to open driveline in '55, the tranny to bellhousing bolt pattern changed. It could also still be using the '53 flywheel,clutch,starter or they could have been upgraded to what they had in '59. Is the starter 6 or 12 volts? Since the two can't be mixed together because of a different number of teeth, knowing what it has for a starter would tell you if you have the '53 stuff in it or not.