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Brake lines are the devil...

The Pumpkinator

The Pumpkinator

1/2 ton status
Joined
Aug 14, 2010
Posts
303
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3
Location
Evanston WY
Courtesy from 18 years of northern Utah (damn road crew salts the place enough to make the salt flats at Bonneville look pathetic)

Any veterans that have bested rusty brake lines without annihilating them? I'm in the middle of installing my lift kit and these damn things have turned out to be exactly what I feared; a pain in the ass, even sharp line wrenches are rounding out the wrench flats:doah:

Hints
Tips
tricks?

I'm kinda in a bind:o
 
I just suffered the same deal last week when I replaced all the lines in my 82 K2500...GM has a nasty habit of using "mongrel" fittings ,like ones on a 3/16" line that have 9/16"x18 threads instead of the usual 3/8x24 threads,forcing you to save the original line nuts if possible,or spend a day chasing down one of those fittings at parts stores (I've had to resort to using junkyard ones when no one had that "special" fitting!)..they also put a fitting with 1/2"x20 threads on the rear 1/4" brake line at the proportioning valve..

Best way to get the old brake lines off is cutting pliers!--snip them close to the fitting you want to save,then use a 6 point socket or box end wrench to remove it being careful not to strip the hex..then you can drill out the old tube and re-use it on your new lines,after double flaring it ..

I hate having to butcher a new line and have to swap the new fittings for the old GM ones and re-flare them,but thats the cheapest way--you could hunt down adapters or those special brake lines that have the "weird" fitting on one end,but they are costly and hard to find around here...

If anyone needs to know,three 60" peices of 1/4" line coupled with unions will do the rear main brake line from the proportioning valve to the rear brake hose,the rear lines on the axle are 30" and 51" (thats what I used anyway),and the front wheels ,I use 51" lines on the right front and a 30" on the drivers side...and you can throw away tose tin "pal nuts" they used to hold the front hoses to the frame bracket and use real nuts with 5/8" x 18 threads...

When your flarte wrench rounds over a fitting,I end up using vise grips or a small pipe wrench to tighten them..unless you get QUALITY flare wrenches like Snap-On,they will likely round the fittings over ,they spread open like they are made of rubber if you try using china or tiwan flare wrenches..:doah:
 
Thanks for all the input guys:D. Well I got them drenched with pb blaster last night and I am spoiled by using nothing but snap-on tools (the luxury of having a father as a airplane mechanic), I bought new fittings for the hard lines coming off of the frame and also the fittings for the T outs on the rear, I'll try yanking them off with some vise grips, if no luck then out comes the die grinder and the flaring tool.

So back up to the airport I go to work on my truck in a aircraft hanger:haha:
 
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