How To Narrow A Rear End

I've recently started making a beefier, viii-3/4″ replacement rearaxle for my '73 Dodge Dart.
The car'southward current rearaxle is a flimsy 7-1/4″ version, with huge backfire on the gears, worn out drums AND only a 4″ wheel boltcircle. The front wheelstuds of the automobile already have a 4.five″ boltcircle, so this rearend is def. not worth it to spend any coin on.

Since Mopar 8-3/four″ A-body rearaxles are hard to find, expensive and if found, usually also still take 4″ boltcircle wheelstuds, I decided to shorten an existing axle housing. Just for kicks!

I found 2 big five″ rounds of aluminium and turned these into beam housing alignment spindles on my lathe. Two for the bearing-ends, and two for inside the tertiary member housing.

I pulled a larger Chrysler C-torso rearaxle out of my 'scrap pile' and cutting the bearing ends of the housing with a pipecutter. Afterward that I besides cut off the amount needed to shorten it from the housing.
In the mean time I had ordered a pair of brand new stock A-Body size axles at DoctorDiff.com

After a while I noticed something not right with the housing ends I had cut off earlier.
The rearaxle I had used was from a 1960 Chrysler, and upto 1964 these cars had a different type of axle, and I learned that twenty-four hour period, therefore also unlike axlehousing ends.
Then out came the pipecutter once more and I pulled some other rearaxle out of my partsstash… only this time I used a 1965 rear finish.

Now information technology was fourth dimension the measure the angle at which the housing ends (and springperches) should end upward at so everything goes well when the rear end is mounted under the car.
And so out came the trusty iPhone with that corking 'Clinometer' app installed!
Later on carefull measuring I tacked the housing ends in place and started measuring again, for skillful measure ya know…! After I "OK'd" my findings, I rotated the powerswitch on my welder onto setting "fullthrottle", and I was off melting steel..!

I had never welded heavy/thick steel earlier but after the first inch or 2 I felt comfortable and welded the rest aswell, welding 1-two inches at a time, at opposite sides.
I likewise mocked-up some (Cherokee?) discbrakes I had laying around to run across if a discbrake conversion is feasible aswell.

And there nosotros are, one rear end, properly sized for a Mopar A-body…