What cars did GM 9 bolt rear ends come in? Are they hard to find or expensive?

Also, what bolts right in place of a 10 bolt. Look at my signature and see that exact clearence is not really a problem, theres a lot of space back there. Its gotta be cheap too.

 

If you look in the 'Tech Data' section of this webite it will tell you what years had the 9 bolt. I believe they came on the f-body's between 86 and 89. The pre 89 9 bolts had a very crappy dic brake setup. The 89 9 bolts are the ones you want. Check out www.9bolt.com for more info. Revlimit hooked me up with mine (89 posi 3.27 discs) for $300. Was a great improvement over the drum brake one wheel wonder 2.73's that were stock.

 

I doubt a 9-bolt will fit in a truck... it would be about a foot too short and would have major issues with fabbing spring perches etc.

What are you really asking? If you're looking to upgrade your truck, probably the best thing is one of the military 14-bolts that are flooding the market right now, since they dropped whatever vehicle it was that used that... a bunch of the off-road places sell them already made up for that truck. I don't know what you mean by "cheap", that's certainly not cheap, but might be inexpensive by some standards. Other than that, you might be able to find a 12-bolt out of an earlier truck or something, with the same spring arrangement you have.

 

Your truck should have an 8.5" 10-bolt. It's a pretty stout piece.

You could also probably find a Dana 60 to put in it. Not sure what years to look, '73-up, maybe?

 

I agree with the last two posts.

Your existing diff is much heftier than anything that came in a third gen.

Check out some of the 73-87 rears from 1/2, 3/4 tons or 4X4s, they'll be bigger than you need, with decent gearing often too. Just watch the wheel bolt pattern.