Fev7

joe_padavano

Welcome. I moved your post to your own thread. Rather than resurrecting an old and somewhat unrelated thread, you should start a new one. Your 64 J88 uses a completely different front suspension than the 65 J88 that was the subject of the thread you resurrected. That's a good way to get bad information as people can get confused.

In your case, no one makes an easy swap. The 1964 J88 uses one-year-only, one-model-only front spindles. Scarebird apparently makes caliper brackets for your spindles, but I have no experience with them. The J88 does use the same wheel bearings as the Cutlass cars, so Cutlass rotors will bolt right onto your spindles, and the wheel bolt pattern is even the same. You need to fabricate caliper brackets, however, or use the Scarebird ones.

Fev7

Fev7

joe_padavano

69-72 A-body rotors (Cutlass, Chevelle, etc). Scarebird just sells brackets. They will tell you what calipers their brackets fit. Personally I'd use the single piston Cutlass calipers that match the rotors and modify the Cutlass brackets to fit the J88 spindles.

Fev7

joe_padavano

Hmmm.

I thought they used to. Unfortunately, the 1964 J88 is one year only and not particularly popular to modify. No, nothing else interchanges. Looks like you'll have to fabricate your own brackets.

jaunty75

Or you could just drive the car with the four-wheel drums.

I owned a '64 Jetstar 88 from 1991 to 1996. I redid the brakes all around when I got the car, and I never had any trouble stopping it in the time I owned it. Neither did the people who bought them new in 1964 and didn't have Scarebird's or any other bird's conversion parts to put on it.

Why fix what ain't broken?

Tedd Thompson

What Jaunty said^^ Disks are better but not so much better that you should have to re engineer your whole front end. I drive on drums all over the place with no issues just like I did and every one else did 50+ years ago. If setup correctly there are plenty of brakes to get you there and back..... Tedd

Fev7

jaunty75

You've got to be kidding. You're going to let a 16-year old drive a car like this to school? This is a collector car, not a beater daily driver that's more appropriate for a high-school kid.

It isn't just the brakes. There MANY safety features on modern cars, even 20-year-old cars, that make them MUCH safer than anything from 1964. Things such as anti-lock brakes, air bags, shoulder belts, headrests, "crumple zones," side-guard protection in the doors, padded dash, collapsible steering column, and the list goes on. You would be far better off, and so would your child, if you bought him something like a 10-year-old Toyota Corolla, or a 2009 Chevy Malibu like shown in the video below, got it in good running order, and kept the Jetstar for your own use on weekend drives to the ice cream stand.


It was a waste of a good '59 Chevy, but it was worth it. In 2009, the Institute for Highway Safety crashed a '59 Impala into a 2009 Malibu, not quite head-on. Watch this video (it's only 2 minutes long), and then tell us you still think it's a good idea, from a safety standpoint, to let a teenager use a car from that era as a daily driver.

After the crash shown, the Malibu driver would walk away. The Impala driver would be dead.

Fev7

jaunty75

There's nothing wrong with him being "interested" in old cars. We all want that, and it's great that father and son can wrench on a car on the weekends. But it's a BIG step from there to letting him use that car as daily transportation, or even once in a while to school (especially to school), where the temptation to let his friends pile in and they all go for a joy ride will be irresistible.

I have three children myself, now age 33, 31, and 29. They were all in high school at one time, and they all drove cars to school. The cars they drove were not brand new, but they were late-model, reliable, and, most importantly, safe.

Getting back to the original question of this thread, in my book, it's a huge waste of time, money, and expense to convert a car like this to four-wheel disk brakes (or even front disks) if no bolt-in kits are available and you have to do all the fabrication and adapting referred to above. These cars stopped just fine with the four drums they were born with as I can attest having owned this exact car myself for five years. I currently own a '67 Delta 88, it has drums on all four wheels, and it stops just fine, too. All I do is keep them up to date on wear parts and keep them properly adjusted, just like I would have done and everyone who owned a car equipped this way did back in 1967.

jaunty75

Another consideration with respect to 16 year old drivers is insurance. I may be saying what you already know, but most people would insure a '64 Oldsmobile as a collector car, not as a daily driver, through someone like Hagerty or J. C. Taylor because of the big savings on premiums and the ability to get an "agreed value" policy. But there are two typical restrictions on collector car insurance that would preclude your son driving the car to school (or at all). These policies don't permit use as a commuter vehicle. The insurance company, for quite understandable reasons, doesn't want the car parked unsecured and unattended, and that's the definition of a high school parking lot. The other, bigger issue is that collector car policies generally don't allow drivers under the age of 25. So you could insure it as a daily driver through someone like State Farm or Allstate, but then you're paying quite a bit more for the insurance, especially with a teenage driver in the mix, and you run the risk of not getting what it's worth should it ever be totaled.

Yes, the deck is stacked against the youngest drivers getting into the old car hobby. But this isn't really a hindrance because the collecting and restoring of old cars is for people with money to burn, and that's usually, unless you were born with a trust fund, for people later in life. Young 20-somethings starting out in life with car loans and student loans and mortgage payments and a young family to raise and college educations for their children and retirement to save for don't usually have thousands of dollars laying around unused to buy and restore an old car. Get them into their 40s and 50s and then maybe. I've been interested in working on cars my whole adult life, but I was 34 before I bought my first old car to restore. It was that '64 Jetstar 88 I've been talking about. I paid $700 for it in 1991. So, yes, it's good to whet your son's appetite for old car preservation, but it's likely to be a couple of decades at the earliest before he is truly able to pursue the hobby on his own.

joe_padavano

You would need to swap to the spindles from any other 1963-64 full size Olds. The problem with doing this is that these spindles take the larger hubs with the 5x5" bolt circle. That means that a) your current wheels won't fit and b) you'd likely want to change the rear axle to match. You can see that there will be a lot of collateral damage. Bottom line is that your car is a low production model with a number of unique features. Unless you plan to do a lot of fabrication (or pay someone to do it) this will not be an easy swap.

I also suspect that the manifolds you have will not work for dual exhaust. Dual exhaust was not available on the 64 J88. The Thornton 350 manifolds will not clear the steering box. Their "Starfire" maifold for the 65-70 full size cars will not work on your 330 as it was designed for the taller deck 425/455 motors. The unique position of the steering box on your 64 makes running dual exhaust a problem. Frankly, without a correct driver side manifold, it is almost easier to run the LH pipe under the oil pan (like the single exhaust crossover) and run both pipes down the passenger side of the car.

While I don't have a problem with letting a younger driver use this car, I think you really need to consider your budget and skills. You have chosen an unpopular, very limited production model to modify. There are many one-year-only features on this car that require custom fabrication to do what you want. No one supports this model with aftermarket parts to easily modify it. What you want to do can be done, but it requires someone with both fabrication skills and knowledge of the specifics of the 1964 J88. If you want to continue given that challenge, more power to you. If you lack the skills to undertake such a project, I'd recommend a more common vehicle for your purpose. Sorry to be blunt about this, but that is reality. I personally would have no problems doing what you plan, but I don't know your fabrication skills or available equipment.

Tedd Thompson

X2 what he said also ^^^ .Tedd

Fev7

joe_padavano

The starter hits the manifold because that Thorntons manifold is designed for a tall deck big block Olds. Your short deck 330 puts the manifold lower and thus closer to the starter. It wasn't designed for this application. The mini starter still has a solenoid. It's the main motor part of the starter that is "mini".

oldcutlass

I don't see an issue letting a 16y/o drive an old car, my son learned to drive on my Cutlass. As Jaunty said insurance may be an issue. We were all 16 at one time and drove these cars when they were a bit newer. Drum brakes stop exceptionally well when they are adjusted and function properly. A minstarter can be clocked, don't know how much room your have to do that. Powermaster makes a starter that fits your engine, I think its the 9510.
https://www.summitracing.com/parts/p...bile/year/1964

Fev7

So again I’ll ask , has anyone found a mini starter kit for a 330?

oldcutlass

Did you look at the Summit link I provided?

joe_padavano

Any starter that fits an Olds 350 or 455 will also fit a 330.

Fev7