I did a 53 Bel Air for a customer years ago. He went with a weld in Mustang II crossmember and suspension. The conversion was relatively easy and as I recall I had it done in a couple of days. The only real issue was for some reason the rack was off set and getting the steering centered with stock tie rod ends was not possible. Fortunately I found out if I used a later (1980s) tie rod end (which are longer) on the driver’s side and a stock MII one on the passengers it worked great.

You might price out a disc brake conversion and possibly power steering for the stock suspension and compare that to the MII conversions before you make up your mind…..I would personally add in the price of 11” brakes to the MII when doing the comparison.

Just an FYI the 1955-1957 Chevrolet car rear ends are a direct bolt in. They have a drop out center section and factory ratios available for the rear end were 3.08, 3.36, 3.55, 3.73 and 4.11. Disc brake conversions for the rear end are readily available if you want to go that route. That may not really help you much but those rears are still readily available at a reasonable price around where I am.




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