Too short brake lines? *warning unsafe content ;o)*
Posted: Thu 18 Oct, 2007 1:55 pm
As you may know, Piggles is a marvel of "do as I say, not as I do" workmanship, mostly in the suspension.
It's a real lash together of temporary bits and pieces.
Anyway, in the front end I have some long shackles, flat, super stiff springs, 2" bumpstop spacers and commodore rear shocks. - A not uncommon lash together for a suzuki built on the cheap.
The front brake lines are a bit too short, but rather than ferret around and find some dodgy ones from my stash of wrecked out suzuki bits, or buy new ones that woudl be miles too long before I sort out my axles, I left the stock ones in, reckoning they were only a little bit too short (and knowing that, as an example, my Hiluxes with OME suspension stretched their brake lines tight at full flex for years)
However, they are obviously quite a bit too short, and here's an alarming way to find this out.
If you are descending an obstacle with your foot on the brake and the car flexes up, take note of whether the brake pedal sinks as the car flexes. If it does, your brake lines are being stretched noticeably and their volume is increasing as they stretch.
It took me a while to work this out - but there you go - make sure you have the right length brakelines or you could run out of brakes when you most want them
It's a real lash together of temporary bits and pieces.
Anyway, in the front end I have some long shackles, flat, super stiff springs, 2" bumpstop spacers and commodore rear shocks. - A not uncommon lash together for a suzuki built on the cheap.
The front brake lines are a bit too short, but rather than ferret around and find some dodgy ones from my stash of wrecked out suzuki bits, or buy new ones that woudl be miles too long before I sort out my axles, I left the stock ones in, reckoning they were only a little bit too short (and knowing that, as an example, my Hiluxes with OME suspension stretched their brake lines tight at full flex for years)
However, they are obviously quite a bit too short, and here's an alarming way to find this out.
If you are descending an obstacle with your foot on the brake and the car flexes up, take note of whether the brake pedal sinks as the car flexes. If it does, your brake lines are being stretched noticeably and their volume is increasing as they stretch.
It took me a while to work this out - but there you go - make sure you have the right length brakelines or you could run out of brakes when you most want them