wicked93gs
15 Year Member
I know you just got finished with the housing...but here is something to consider: What I am going to do is use an 8.8 housing from whatever I can find the cheapest and cut off both housing ends and weld on 9" housing ends like this: https://www.summitracing.com/parts/msr-7700
You may ask why....there are a couple advantages to this approach:
1. Shortening an explorer axle is 1 weld....but adding 9" ends is only 2 welds, so not much more difficult(though an alignment bar should be used)
2. This gets rid of having to retain the axles with c-clips...you use 9" axles from a Granada or a Ranchero(depending on the spline of your carrier) or even custom axles since they don't really cost that much. Since you use 9" axles, you also use 9" bearings and retaining plates without leaky c-clip eliminators.
3. Bolt on brake kits for classic mustangs bolt on. The 8.8" of course has plenty of brake options, but what you will never find using an 8.8" end is a bolt on rear brake kit designed to complement a bolt on front disc brake kit. IE, if you run SoT front brakes, you won't find a perfectly matched kit for the rear...but if you have 9" ends instead you can run the full kit that has many hours of testing behind it.
P.S. While you are there...I would consider bracing the 8.8 rear and fully welding the axle tubes as well...in theory if you do that the rear end can take 1000+HP according to the internet:
Easy enough to do while its out, this one is double braced, but a single brace would probably do the trick fine.
You may ask why....there are a couple advantages to this approach:
1. Shortening an explorer axle is 1 weld....but adding 9" ends is only 2 welds, so not much more difficult(though an alignment bar should be used)
2. This gets rid of having to retain the axles with c-clips...you use 9" axles from a Granada or a Ranchero(depending on the spline of your carrier) or even custom axles since they don't really cost that much. Since you use 9" axles, you also use 9" bearings and retaining plates without leaky c-clip eliminators.
3. Bolt on brake kits for classic mustangs bolt on. The 8.8" of course has plenty of brake options, but what you will never find using an 8.8" end is a bolt on rear brake kit designed to complement a bolt on front disc brake kit. IE, if you run SoT front brakes, you won't find a perfectly matched kit for the rear...but if you have 9" ends instead you can run the full kit that has many hours of testing behind it.
P.S. While you are there...I would consider bracing the 8.8 rear and fully welding the axle tubes as well...in theory if you do that the rear end can take 1000+HP according to the internet:
Easy enough to do while its out, this one is double braced, but a single brace would probably do the trick fine.