I just hit the salvage yard for a complete rear ($50) and stripped it using the calipers for a core replacement. The rotors were good so they were reused and all she needed was new pads and E-brake cables
TJ rear disc brake conversion
- Thread starter JeepDew
- Start date
There should be little difference in price between Ford 8.8, ZJ rear discs, Liberty rear discs, or Jeep Rubicon rear discs since they are all roughly the same parts with only some minor fitment differences.
I did this swap last fall and have less than $150 in the swap. I pulled the rear brake assemblies (caliper, caliper mounting bracket, rotor and soft brake line) from a 97 ZJ for $100(?) from Pull a Part and swapped onto the Dana 35 of my 97 TJ. I was able to re-use pads, rotor and caliper, but everything bolted right up with the exception of the parking brake cable. Had I salvaged this from the ZJ, it would have been a bolt on swap, however since I kept the TJ cable I ended up using a cable clamp to attach my stock cable to the ZJ brake lever.
I made the swap in lieu of rebuilding the drum brakes on my TJ and for the benefit of the ease of maintenance and performance in the unavoidable southeast mud.
Edit: Picture added because pictures make everything better. First mockup of brake install.
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This is my reasoning for it as well. I will be keeping the Dana 35, and just do a Super Dana 35 kit and upgrade to discs, unless I can find a Dana 44 for super cheap lol
Every one says stopping not increase. However, mine been take care by me and professional jeep guys. Still fronts work when rear nothing unless constantly adjust. Forget that. Disc much better
All TJ’s come equipped with disc brakes in the front.
The discussion is on the validity of swapping the rear drums for disks.
Since 75% of the braking is in the front, there is no real braking benefit to swapping the rears. The only benefit is ease of maintenance.
So I tried to do a terra flex rear disc conversion today. Mainly because I scored it for a good price, and I had a rear wheel cyl blow out. Either way,
I am not real thrilled with what I bought lol. The holes didnt line up, on the backing plates to begin with. I over came that by drilling and a little carbide grinder action. It all looked real good, till I tried to remount my wheels....nope. not only are the wheel studs too short, but the caliper hits the inside of my stock canyon wheels. I wasn't sure what to do, so for the time being I have no rear brakes lol had to get creative with my taps and make a cap for the rear lines out of some scrap Derlin. If anyone has any advice Id appreciate it. Thanks
I am not real thrilled with what I bought lol. The holes didnt line up, on the backing plates to begin with. I over came that by drilling and a little carbide grinder action. It all looked real good, till I tried to remount my wheels....nope. not only are the wheel studs too short, but the caliper hits the inside of my stock canyon wheels. I wasn't sure what to do, so for the time being I have no rear brakes lol had to get creative with my taps and make a cap for the rear lines out of some scrap Derlin. If anyone has any advice Id appreciate it. Thanks
The wheel stud issue is not Tera's fault. If the backing plate holes were a symmetrical pattern, again not their fault, someone misinformed you as to the fitment. TJ 35 and 44 have the same pattern exactly, 8.8 has a symmetrical pattern that matches the big bearing 9" axle housing ends.
Tera uses the 8.8 caliper. It has a larger section that rubs on some rims due to the shape of the body.
The caliper from a 94-98 Grand Cherokee has a smaller section. You should be able to find some that use the original cores and then some matching pads and bolt those up. Be aware that there are at least 5 different cores in that style caliper and the aftermarket rebuilders tend to ignore that and you can wind up with what you have now. You'll have to take one of yours with and compare. There are also some differences between piston centerline relative to mounting bolts but they all fit the same backing plate. You may have to snag the matching rotors.
Shortly after purchasing my '01 I did a thorough inspection of the brake system and found that the rear drum brakes were in terrible condition.
The wheel cylinders were leaking and the pistons were rusty, the drums were grooved and rusty, the emergency brake barely moved and all the interior parts were rusted.
Priced out replacement parts and found the total on all the drum replacement parts were within $100 of what the disc conversion would cost.
Purchased the BMB disc brake kit (conversion for brake lines and emergency brake cables) from @mrblaine along with Centrix Premium Rotors and the longer ZJ wheel studs..
The conversion kit was easy to install; the most difficult part was cutting and creating an automotive double flares to both brake lines.
The removal of the drum brakes and installation of the disc brake kit took about 4.5 hours thanks to the help of my brother and a knowledgeable Jeep friend.
The wheel cylinders were leaking and the pistons were rusty, the drums were grooved and rusty, the emergency brake barely moved and all the interior parts were rusted.
Priced out replacement parts and found the total on all the drum replacement parts were within $100 of what the disc conversion would cost.
Purchased the BMB disc brake kit (conversion for brake lines and emergency brake cables) from @mrblaine along with Centrix Premium Rotors and the longer ZJ wheel studs..
The conversion kit was easy to install; the most difficult part was cutting and creating an automotive double flares to both brake lines.
The removal of the drum brakes and installation of the disc brake kit took about 4.5 hours thanks to the help of my brother and a knowledgeable Jeep friend.
Unfortunately, covid killed the quality of the rear disc conversion and we haven't found any alternates that we would use ourselves so we don't sell them.
Basically I bought a kit that was told it would work with a dana 35, for a TJ, and this is the kit they sold me. So are you saying they shipped me a kit for a ford 8.8? interesting, either way, doesn't really matter at this point. Thanks for taking the time to reply to me. So that is really great news, because I was about to rebuild my drums and shelf my kit. Are you saying that the calipers from grand Cherokee 94-98' will fit, but basically it was an earlier design that got replaced by the calipers I have now? and so basically there are both styles floating around, being sold for the same vehicle? I wonder if they have diff part numbers.
I was able to get a part number for the longer studs as, well. So ill try and get some of those too. Thank you again for the information.
It will and does work on a Dana 35 and likely a Dana 44 and Chrysler 8.25. The issue isn't the axle it is on, the issue is the rim you are trying to use.
Not at all. Since the backing plates are very similar from the same casting with minor variances for different applications, they picked the Ford caliper and used it on a backing plate with Jeep housing end pattern and then probably Ford parking brake shoes and the 8.8 rotor which is hard to tell from the Jeep rotors until you measure them very closely.
Yes, they should solve your problem and you will need the pads from the same year and model.
There are 3 versions of that backing plate in use. All the same casting with minor variations. Ford 8.8, Jeep ZJ, and Jeep TJ. None of them are exactly the same, none are so different that you can tell at a glance. All use different parking brake shoes and hardware kits, different calipers and pads, different rotors but the differences are slight and big enough to not interchange exactly except to all work on the same backing plate.
thank you for clarifying. I see what your saying. I'll have to take a good look at those calipers, and verify that they are indeed a bit thicker, that would be awsome.
Core suppliers and rebuilders don't always pay as much attention as they should to what cores they use. You need to take the current calipers with you so you have something to compare the parts store versions to. Since all the cores will accept the same dust boots, guide sleeves, banjo bolts, pistons, piston seals, pads, and bleeder screws, the only thing that makes them different is the slight differences in body shape.