I did my PBR upgrade months ago, but discovered shortly thereafter a leak in my master cylinder. I decided I might as well go ahead with the rear disc conversion, and since that meant a huge increase in brake piston volume that I should do DG's tbird master cylinder upgrade too.
There was holdup after holdup, but it's finally done!
I bled the brake system tonight pretty uneventfully. Once that was done, I was really worried about actually testing it. We had a blast making brake lines for my friend's '86 SPG - tons of leaks, bad flares, etc. This time I had a massive hydraulic flaring tool which it turns out isn't all that great, but it made far more reliable flares than the vice-mounted tool we'd used before.
Anyway, pumped the pedal a few times to build up pressure, then stood on it. It held firmly, no sinking. A quick visual under the hood and no leaks, so that's a plus. I need a helper to verify all is good since I can't stand on the pedal and check for leaks at the same time, but I'd say initial results are positive!
This is my reworked brake force distribution center.
This is my rerouted brake line to the passenger side. Previously, the line went about halfway up the false bulkhead, at the level of the top of the block deck. That was NOT fun to get out of the car, so when I redesigned the brake lines I routed them much higher, and stuck in a coupler to facilitate future removal/reinstallation. I doubt I'll ever need to pull it apart again, and honestly I wish there wasn't a coupler, but it was the easiest way to put it all back together, and I wasn't 100% confident my flares would work.
Finally, here is the passenger side of the line. The line used to run along at the height of that frame rail, right behind the exhaust elbow off the turbo. I hope a side benefit of rerunning this line is a little more distance between it and the exhaust, which may help keep the fluid slightly cooler. I doubt it, but it's a nice thought.
I resused what 4mm brake line I could, the rest of it is from NAPA. All the fittings came from http://www.fedhillusa.com - they were a pleasure to deal with, and one of the few places that not only catalogged bubble flare stuff, but also stocked it! Yes, I could have switched to inverted flares or something, but my goal was to retain as much of the stock setup as possible, and ensure compatibility with Mike's stainless lines. The flaring tool is a hydraulic MasterCool universal kit. $300 - it worked, but I think there may be better tools out there for not much more. In its favor it does ALL the flares out of the box, including the push connect fuel lines, so maybe that'll come in handy some day. I'm debating on re-bay-ing it and buying the flaring tool than Fed Hill sells... although, really, I don't expect I will ever have to flare anything ever again!
With any luck tomorrow I can put the new ported manifolds on and get to finding all sorts of fluid leaks. It appears I've got at least a p/s leak and a coolant leak, and possibly an oil leak from the cam area. I think I've already solved the last one, but I won't know til she's running again. What fun!
