Bus Disc Brake Conversion

Advokat · Post by **Advokat** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 3:44 pm

Group:

Some of you may remember me as a former Thing owner. I no longer have my Thing, but do have a '68 Singlecab.
The question I have is about brakes and I hope that some general VW knowlege might be sent my way.

Anyway, years ago I purchased the Things Unlimited front disc conversion kit. Those of you who have done this conversion know how easy and great that kit was as it was extremely reasonably priced and very complete. In short, it consisted of a custom caliper bracket that was a direct bolt-on affair to the standard Thing ball joint, drum front spindle. It then essentially used Karman Ghia components.

Okay, I am looking to do something similar to my '68 Singlecab and it seems that the pricing of such kits are crazy. Lots of guys opt for using Porsche 944 components w/a similar custom bracket. Does anyone know of something like the good old kit from Things Unlimited that would allow the use of such parts like the Karman Ghia-or-someone that can fab. a caliper bracket to work with my stock spindle but then let me use later year bus components? I know that I can go with later bus spindles and then just use those components, but I am trying to avoid having to pull my existing spindles as I really do not want to go through the hassle of separating the ball joints. I did this on another car recently and it was a huge PITA.

Thanks,
Rick

Kubelmann · Post by **Kubelmann** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 7:31 pm

I wish I had information on this question. But there are a good number of Thing owners (myself included) who are alos bus owners. I have a 79 that came with front disc brakes. I suspect you will need to post this on the Bus section. Unless.... One of you bus folks step up with information.

Advokat · Post by **Advokat** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 5:32 am

Hi K-Mann-

I did post it over there and there were responses, but I thought about you guys since that kit was Thing specific and so darned easy to use.

Thanks,
Rick

Kubelmann · Post by **Kubelmann** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 7:38 am

Did you ever get the info you wanted about your disc brake conversion?

Advokat · Post by **Advokat** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 12:19 pm

Hey K-Man,

Thanks for your interest. Yes, I got some answers, but it seems that nothing is quite as straight forward as one would have thought. I guess that the good news is that there are literally hundreds of combinations that will work. I just need to decide which one will fit my budget constraints and what parts are going to be reasonably available locally. These are heavy components and shipping them is not very cost effective.

I will let you know what I ultimately end up doing and the relative satisfaction level.

Thanks again and happy New Year,
Rick

Kubelmann · Post by **Kubelmann** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 7:33 am

Sounds good. And thanks for the new years wishes..