Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

hi all, I have already converted the front axles to five stud hubs,

but now I want to do the rears,

I was wondering if it is possible to just swap the trailing arms from the 924 to the 924s ones I have with the five stud hubs on ???

or will I need to swap over the whole rear suspension ?

cheers roy

Hi Roy,

Contact James McLauchlan as he did this conversion to his 924.

Alan.

Normally I change over the following parts from a pre 1986 944

* Rear calipers
* Rear disks
* Handbrake cables
* Rear stub axle (the shaft that has the flange for the driveshaft on one end and the studs on the other)
* Rear stub axle backing plates
* Handbrake shoes, cam and springs

And make up some new brake pipes that go from the flexis all the way down the arm to the calipers.

Quite an easy job, we used to be forever doing these on almost a monthly basis back 10 years ago, I in fact still have about 3 sets of 924 turbo wheels and kits of the parts to do the fronts and rears.

There also used to be a particular VW Beetle which used the same parts list to convert the rear of a Beetle to disk brakes and allow the use of Porsche wheels.

Or you can do what I did and get a set of rear drums ready drilled to the 5 stud pattern. Got mine from a beetle specialist called machine 7. Strait swap just need the standard spacers and longer bolts. Let me know if you want more details

Thats pretty cool... Was that for a Beetle, or did it work on the 924, if so, was it also drilled for the standard studs from the stub, or did you have to remove them and the drum bolted to those and then the wheel bolted to an extra set of studs in the spacer or drum?

thanks for the replies,

I already new the bits to swap over,

just wanted to check there was no issues with bolting a 924S alloy trailing arm onto the older 924 suspension carrier
as it has been refurnished and new bearings fitted


front finished

They are intended for a beetle but fit strait on to the 924, exactly the same as the normal 4 bolt ones just drilled for 5 bolt I used a set of spacers from the back of an early 944 and longer wheel bolts. Have now fitted bolt on spacers with studs so that I have nuts front and back ( fitted 944 front hubs/uprights).
Interestingly they do, or did 5 bolt front disc/hubs also direct fit on a 924, I just wanted the bigger vented discs The brakes are great plenty of stopping power and standard hand brake. so no need to change cables or pipes.
Did the whole swap front and back in an afternoon once the 944 hubs were overhauled.

http://www.machine7.com/product.php?xProd=1661&xSec=992

This should be them

ROY924GT,

Sorry, I don't think I paid attention, had not realised you are wanting to fit the entire rear arm from a later 924S to your 924 rear beam and spring plates.. That is a different kettle of fish.. in theory, it should be straight forward, but I have not done it myself in that configuration, so can't say it will be a direct and easy fit.. But it should be.

When I did the 5stud conversion on the rear of my 924 using the alloy rear arms the problems I came across were as follows. The plate that comes from the torsion bar and mounts to the alloy arm was a slightly different shape , As I had got the complete torsion bar assembly I ended up swaping the whole thing. The shock absorbers are different ,The shock absorber mounting hole on the steel arms are 12mm diameter on the alloy arms they are threaded m14 fine thread. An finally the drive shafts are shorter for the alloy arms than they are for the steel arms .Apart from that it went together quite simply, as previously mentioned the 924 hand brake cables whould have to be swaped for 944 ones Hope this helps

The Beetle drum drilling technique is as old as their fitting Porsche wheels. Beetles had a 130mm four stud PCD, so one original hole was used and four more drilled - none of which come too close to the remainung three original holes.

924s use the front brakes from a NSU/VW K70 and the rear brakes from a Beetle, making it an easier method than swapping the rear hubs if youre as interested in the wheels as you are the brakes.

Brake balance will be terrible though.

Curious as to Why brake balance would be terrible ? Surely If you substitue drums and disks drilled for 5 stud you end up with exactly the same setup as standard.

My setup is 5 stud drums with 944 vented disks at the front and I have absolutly no balance issues no matter how hard I brake.

Worth pointing out that the drums and disks on the link above are 5 stud as standard not redrilled.

If memory serves me right the 924 has a dual circuit system that links the nearside front and offside rear as one circuit , and offside front and nearside rear as the other . On the 944 the front brakes are on one circuit and the rear brakes are on the other circuit . When I did my convertion I fitted a 944 master cylinder and piped the brakes as the 944 ensuring the master cylinder is plumbed in correctly so it applies more braking force to the front and not the rear

Thought that the later 924 and the 944 had the same circuit split, seems logical that when the 44 was launched porsche would go for comonality of layout. When I fitted the vented front brakes I left the rest of the system standard, same master cylinder same split etc, literally just bolted on the hubs, disks and calipers together with the new 5 stud drums.

Can only report that I have no balance issues, car brakes straight with no tendancy for the rear to lock up. Been driving with this setup for 10 years plus with no issues at all.

You may be right , The 924 I was using was a 1978 model .I fitted new aeroquip brake lines throughout the car and the 944 master cylinder as a precaution and mounted an upright hydraulic handbrake on the torque tube tunneling