what axle should i put on my camaro if im putting a 454 with a 400 trans

 

a big one

 

9 bolt if it can found. Thats what i am hunting for currently. Worst comes to worst, get a F.O.R.D. 9" or a Chevy 12 bolt. I do believe 9 bolts are lighter and i dont know about stronger but good for over the 400 hp mark that 10 bolts have.

 

9 bolts and 10 bolts are really in the same boat when your making that much power. either get ready to spend some serious cash on a bolt in unit from moser, strange, currie, or the like. OR, you can fabricate one to fit. i'll be using a chevy 8.5" 10bolt, which i've seen go 8.3's in the 1/4 in a 3300lbs cutlass, so i know they will work well, and they are lighter than a 12bolt or 9". but people have retrofitted all kinds of strong rearends into these cars, to include the 8 3/4" chrysler, 8.8" ford, 8.5" 10 bolts, dana 44's (which were actually available through gmpp back in the day) and i've even seen full floating dana 60's, though i wouldn't suggest that one...

another option is to run a different type of suspenion entirely, going to something like the southside machine lift bars, which are bascially a primitive ladder bar setup. this will do away with the torque arm setup completely and make retrofitting a stronger rearend into your car MUCH easier...but i'm a big fan of stock style suspenion with a torque arm. this allows me to run my car in many different classes when i go to drag race,though many people don't class race like me. that and i like the challenge of getting stock style suspenion to work well.

 

Spohn Performance, Inc.

Period

 

nova, you're modifying an 8.5" 10 bolt to fit eh?

Please share how you get it to work, and fit. I'm curious as to how difficult it is, assuming you stick with full stock suspension.

 

i will be sticking with full stock suspenion to open my options up to different classes. when i start the build, i'll keep EVERYONE updated!

 

I’ve broken 6 sets of 10 bolt gears in the last few years… ended up buying a formula with a 9 bolt in it and gave it a shot for a while after checking out the “stronger then a dana 44…” comments… haven’t broken any gears but have twisted up 3 axles and wear out the posi on a regular basis (it works out to be every 35 dragstrip passes).

I kind of like the idea of modifying an 8.5” 10 bolt… slightly smaller/lighter then the other heavy duty axles and almost as strong. There’s plenty of full size chevy trucks with them running around and not breaking under fairly heavy loads, and I’d bet the axle tubes would become a liability on them first just like on the 12 bolts, so basically it would fail about the same time that a 12 bolt would anyway, just cost you less to start with. OTOH, with the amount of cheap 8.8” ford stuff out there if I was going to the effort I’d probably use one of them (or as I posted before, an 8.75” Chrysler would be my other choice since it has a drop out center section like a 9” ford but a pinion offset more like the salisbury style axles).

I gave in and got myself a moser 9”, nodular center section, 35 spline axles, locker… hopefully I won’t figure out how to break that…

 

these are my thoughts EXACTLY!!!John Balinsky is still running a (heavily modified) 8.5" 10bolt under his 85 cutlass that runs 8.3x's with a 632 donovan bbc with two foggers...i think it'll handle my 360 with no power adders...and probably my next motor or two.