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14 year old insights and rusted brake and gas lines

54K views 174 replies 64 participants last post by  joeaax1j 
Can anyone verify what size lines the brake lines are? Are they all the same size?

If we happen to get a short warm spell that falls around a weekend, I'd love to just splice in a patch to the line (Assuming it's in a spot that's reachable and easily patched) and hold off on the total replacement until spring/summer gets here. At the moment, I'm not 100% where its leaking. Hoping it's underneath the passenger area, which would be easy to reach. My guess is I got damage from an animal or ice chunk here in the last few months. Despite the case the car is subject to salt, the engine has leaked enough oil over time, the underside of the car is coated. LOL, self serve fluid film.
I just received my SS Tubes brake line replacement set and they are all marked 3/16

They are really nice, for the price I can't imagine going through all the trouble to fab up your own lines using Cu-Ni. Plus Cu-Ni probably should be supported at closer intervals than the original stiff steel ones.

Patching is doable but not like patching fuel line... the pressure can reach 1000psi so a couple hose clamps isn't going to cut it. You need to make a proper hydraulic connection, and the effort to do so might be more than the effort to replace the whole line. I'm guessing when you start looking at your brake and fuel lines you're going to see more rust at more places than you expect.
 
Just finished this job. I'd estimate I used three full days (8 hours x 3) although that included some extra work like sandblasting and painting my old caliper brackets, and doing the fuel lines as well.

A couple pointers for anyone going to tackle this. It is a big job. I'd consider myself an advanced ameuter mechanic (I've done transmissions and rebuilt engines, clutch jobs, etc). I'd consider this a medium-advanced level task. You definitely need to be comfortable turning wrenches on rusty nuts and bolts without stripping them, and dealing with the consequences if you do. It's also just a big job, lots of things to keep track of. That said, much of it is just tedious.

Basic tools necessary beyond typical sockets/wrenches/pliers are a 10mm brake line wrench, 4 tall jack stands, a can of penetrating lubricant, and a clear hose to bleed the brakes.

Highly recommended would be an impact wrench, a propane torch, a driver of some sort for all the millions of 10mm bolts (I use an air ratchet, but an impact driver works as well), and an interior trim tool to remove the plastic clips without breaking them.

One thing I didn't know before starting this job is that it is NOT necessary to remove the fuel tank in order to do the brake lines. Although the old LR brake line goes behind the tank, the new stainless ones take a different routing to that wheel and it's not needed to drop the tank. Now, to replace the fuel lines (which you probably need to do) is certainly much easier with the tank out of the way but having looked at it, I'm pretty certain I could carefully fish the new fuel lines up and over the tank with the tank in place. It would be fiddly though, there are clips involved, you still need to get access to the top of the tank, and once you've done that much it's not much more work to drop the tank which certainly creates better access and lets you clean the years of accumulated crud out of there.

The stainless lines are thoughtfully divided up into sections in some places which makes threading them much easier. Really a top-notch job.

The Honda fuel lines are too big to reasonably ship. I picked them up directly from Majestic Honda.

It is NOT necessary to touch the exhaust at all to drop the tank. Lower the left side first and it slides right out assuming you've emptied the tank so it's not too heavy.

My brake rotors where original. One was rusted on so badly that it had to be removed in pieces. New ones are cheap as are reman calipers.

The right front flexible brake hose is NLA from Honda. The Dorman replacement doesn't quite fit correctly, the mounting holes don't line up, so had to mount with just one screw instead of two.

Where the rear flexible lines bolt to the steel subframe is almost certainly very rusty. Too much torque can bend the attachment brackets, I had to use penetrant, heat, and a pair of large pliers counteracting the torque of the ratchet to prevent tearing the brackets right off.

One of my rear bleeder screws snapped off despite penetrant + heat. I just tossed the cylinder and ordered a new one. Cheap.

I broke every fuel line clip. Rather than order Honda, I ordered a bunch of cable-tie clips from Amazon. Similarly broke most of the plastic clips which hold the underbody panels on. Ordered a set of 100 (!!) from Amazon for about $9.

Most of the places where the old brakes lines attach will be corroded into place and even with the proper wrench there is a risk of rounding. Remember that you're throwing it all away, and just use a set of snips to cut the brake line flush with the fitting, then you can get a proper socket on it.

After 18 years of New England salt, there where many places where my old brake and fuel lines could be twisted apart by hand. I put it off way too long. After it was all together, I sprayed all the remaining rusty bits down with LPS 3 to try forestall the inevitable.
 
One thing I meant to add, which I thought of after doing this whole job, is that the fuel lines are a major PITA. Expensive, tough to source, unwieldy to replace, and the main reason to drop the tank.

However unlike the brake lines the fuel lines are low pressure, mostly plastic coated, and actually only really rust in two places... right at the end in the engine compartment, and where they make the transition from horizontal steel to vertical plastic (next to the fuel tank). So, if I had to do this over again, I would consider simply cutting out the rusty bits and splicing in some replacement fuel hose. Could be done relatively easy in place.
 
I need to do the long run of the brake lines. I saw that Ebay has stainless in one piece is that your source that you used for your job , I would like to not drop the fuel tank and get into more repairs
I ordered mine from sstubes. Fine Lines is the brand. I suspect the ebay ones are the same thing.
 
Oh yeah, one other thing, the stainless lines are pretty good quality but there was one connection that leaked on me no matter how much I tightened it. Maybe I damaged the sealing surface during the install. The solution was a copper washer which is more malleable. Parker 2GF-3 available on Amazon or elsewhere. Maybe order up a pack of those.
 
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