How necessary is brake swedging for these hubs+drums?

[Just Carbs]

One Item, universally found in all the de-swaging threads I've seen: A drill press with the drum WELL stabilized is necessary to the job. Both the tungsten carbide cutting bits on the tool, and the drum itself require perfect lateral stability to prevent ruining the drum and breaking the carbide cutters off the bit. Much as I live DIY work, I refuse to spend that much money just to de-swage the two hubs I now possess.

I felt the same way. But I did obtain the cutter when the car demanded new drums.

 

[Gerald Morris]

I felt the same way. But I did obtain the cutter when the car demanded new drums.

Might as well at that point I reckon. Mind you, had the rear drums still been swaged on, I too would have popped the $125 or so for the bit. I don't appreciate swaging drums.....

 

[Big_John]

Might as well at that point I reckon. Mind you, had the rear drums still been swaged on, I too would have popped the $125 or so for the bit. I don't appreciate swaging drums.....

I used a hole saw for the 7/16" studs on my Barracuda. It cost me about $12 a couple years ago. $15 if I did it today.

I found a 9/16" OD hole saw had a ID of just over 7/16". It also had to be long enough to go over the length of the stud. After removing the drill, I went in with my Dremel and ground back the saw kerf on the inside.

Then I chucked it up in my older than me drill press, set the speed to slow, and brought it down over the stud, added a little cutting oil, then turned it on and cut the swage off. Leaving it down, I turned the press off before letting the saw up. By doing that, I minimized the chances of doing any damage to the threads.

It worked perfectly.

I'll bet, with a little care and a steady hand, it could be done without a drill press.

 

[3175375]

Just so I understand, who has actually done this? I have new drums from Craig and haven’t done anything with them yet.
Would it make sense to do this and does someone have the step by step?

My target vehicle for this is a 68 Plymouth Fury II - Elwood.

 

[Ross Wooldridge]

Many years ago I had my new drums swaged to the front studs on my turquoise 66 Monaco. I had the old ones cut off by a grey beard pro using proper drill press and a swage cutter. The rear drums are not swaged to the rear studs.

I would not bother swaging new studs to front drums as it's not really necessary.

I am like @Big_John - one can cut off the old swages by hand if one is careful - I did it with a disc rotor with a dremel, and pushed the studs out carefully. No damage to the rotor, but keep in mind I did NOT resuse those studs, but replaced them with new - I was switching from LH to RH studs. I did not swage the new studs either, but by using NOS studs, the knurling is the right size, and I lined them up to the existing knurl marks and drew them in with nuts. They lined up nicely and fit the knurling in the rotor which kept them nice and tight. Swaging is just a factory redundancy.

 

[Big_John]

Since the drums were toast anyway, I wasn't worried about destroying them when I took them off. I did want to preserve the 7/16" studs, especially the LH studs, so they were never pressed out.

After cutting the swage off, I just laid a scrap of wood on top of the hub and smacked it with a BFH. It separated with a couple blows... I'll bet the drums were bent, but they were getting scrapped anyway.

 

[Ross Wooldridge]

Yup - by "pressed them out carefully" after I'd cut off the swages, it was literally a block of wood and a BFH used gently. They came out quite easily, and in my case, I'm sure the rotors were not damaged.

 

[Big_John]

Yup - by "pressed them out carefully" after I'd cut off the swages, it was literally a block of wood and a BFH used gently. They came out quite easily, and in my case, I'm sure the rotors were not damaged.

The last studs I changed were in the rear of my 300L. Someone had already converted the front to RH, so it made more sense to just change the rear to RH rather than screw with the fronts.

I don't see why this wouldn't work with the fronts too. Obviously the swage would still need to be trimmed back.

I used a broken air chisel bit, ground flat. Then I slipped a piece of 1/2" heater hose over it and used the air chisel to knock the studs out. No damage to anything, including the old studs.

New studs were installed with a $10 tool I found on Amazon. The same could be done with some 1/2" washers and a little grease.

 

[Ross Wooldridge]

Really good advice!

 

[3175375]

Just so I understand, who has actually done this? I have new drums from Craig and haven’t done anything with them yet.
Would it make sense to do this and does someone have the step by step?

My target vehicle for this is a 68 Plymouth Fury II - Elwood.

I discovered this video. I will look for some others too.

 

[Gerald Morris]

I felt the same way. But I did obtain the cutter when the car demanded new drums.

Yah, I might have done the same in your situation.

 

[70bigblockdodge]

It's a assembly like thing. As long as your hub register is snug/good new drum your golden.
Picture in your mind assembly line worker. Grabs drum and hub as one unit with bearings already installed and greased from previous process. Slips it onto brake assembled spindle with lower ball joint attached. Sets the bearing preload with shop tool/equipment, dust caps it and it moves on to front suspension assembly. Which is done on stub frame in C bodies, K frame on the rest. Then that moves further along line to the body drop. So you cannot have the drums falling off as stub frame moves down track waiting till much further before wheels are put on. Modern cars and rear axles in our cars use those little star washers. Some modern cars use a torx headed screw to hold rotors on, mostly anal rententive European car makers, which has spread to copy cat Asian cars also.

 

[Ross Wooldridge]

As are the rear drums on my 66 - held on with sheet metal nut clips.