What all is involved in a half heavy setup?

[NightRunner]

I may be in the minority here, but i like my 10 bolt with the G80 option. You could probably save a decent amount of money grabbing new half axles from a junkyard and rebuilding the R&P, it's not rocket surgery, assuming you do a like for like replacement.

I'm not exactly sure what's salvageable from this 10 bolt right now. I'm pretty sure the entire thing is junk at this point. So I feel it'd probably be more involved trying to rebuild the half axles rather than just replacing the thing in the bulk. And this is hoping it's just the axle and not the brake booster or lines that's causing the issue. I'm not sure, the PO really trashed this system.

You get the 6 lug 9.5" 14 bolt from a "light duty" (6 lug) C2500, key there being -C- 2500, the axle is very close to the same width as your existing C1500's 10 bolt. It's the 4x4 axle that is wider by several inches, so skip it. Get the u-bolt saddle plates while you're there; the axle tubes are larger so your old ones won't work. Use new u-bolts though, always. And of course, the conversion joint, which the # is in numerous 14 bolt swap threads, don't have it handy.

For the front - 88-91 can have the standard duty brakes which would use a shorter stub axle on the spindle, but yours being an extended cab should have the heavy duty brake package already with the slightly longer stub axle. With this you just swap the 6 lug rotors from the donor truck right on. No need to change spindles. The rotors are the same already, just 6 lug instead of 5.

Richard

This is really informative, thanks for the help!

 

[90halfton]

His truck is a C1500; if he gets the axle from a C2500 6 lug truck he is fine. The axles are roughly the same width and the wheels do not have a significantly different offset. The front suspension setup between the two trucks is the same other than bolt pattern, and the aforementioned brake package difference in my previous reply. At no point do spacers come into play here, especially on the front.

The 4WD axle is the wider one and would be a bad choice for a swap into a C1500.

Richard

Right. But if the 6 lug wheels he will put on it have a radical offset and he uses a 2wd axle it will set the wheels farther inside the wheel well. Alot of newer body style wheels have a much different offset. What I was trying to convey was that if you know what wheels you're going to use it would pay to bust out a tape measure and measure the offset.

 

[someotherguy]

Yeah, I hear you now, it wasn't exactly clear in your original reply. Definitely agreed some 6 lug wheels - mostly aftermarket - may not have the correct backspacing for this. Some are worse than others.

Something also worth noting is -some- of the aftermarket 6 lug wheels won't even fit the front on a C2500LD GMT400. They're designed for the inboard bearing of the GMT800-up setups; the GMT400 hub flange in the outer bearing area is too large for some of them, and some the center cap design is too shallow leaving you with a bearing dust cap that knocks the center cap off or prevents it from being installed. Easy way to test for this one is just take one of the 6 lug rotors with dust cap installed and try dropping it into the back of a wheel you're interested in.

The stock wheels from the C2500 will be fine as they share the same basic measurements as the C1500 wheels.

Richard