Hard brake line question

[mollyman]

I have swaped in a 14blt in my 81 k10 sub. I am going to put disc brakes on soon. I was also going to lift the body off in the near future to box the frame and do some other stuff. So I was wondering is it possable to run braded ss lines in place of all the hard lines or is this a stupid thought? Also I know it has been talked about before but I got tired off trying to find the old thread so I am going to ask again. When I put on the disc brakes in the rear what will I need to do (if anything) to the "regulator" that the lines run through up in the front of the truck. I am not sure what the thing is called but it is mounted on the crossmember in front of the engine and the hard lines run into and out of it on their way to the rear. Any help would be great THANKS

 

[divorced]

I had to do nothing to my proportioning valve when I did mine.

Are you wanting to use braided hose from the front, along the frame, to the rear? It seems to me that you would want to use as much hard line as possible since there is probably some expansion when the braided lines have pressure applied to them.

Why wouldn't you want to run hard line to the back?

 

[AKbigsub]

I agree with the pressure thing. I have also been told and have read that braded lines are not good to use if you are in the mud and water a lot. Fine dirt gets between the brade metal and the ruber line and abrades the rubber. I do not have personal experience with this but it makes sense. Maybe others can chime in.
For my swap, I did not have to do anything with the prop. valve either. And I used some cool new hard lines on the 14 bolt from NAPA that you can bend by hand with out pinching.

 

[ntsqd]

The expansion under pressure of braided SS hose isn't enough to notice over using tube instead. I've plumbed a couple complete systems this way. One was a pro Road Race car, the other a Pro-Mod car. I doubt the drag racer would ever care, but the road racer would care & he didn't think it was a problem at all. The truck will be faster with it, won't lugging around the heavy-ass wallet......

The mud & grime factor is one to think about. If you opt to use the braided I would highly suggest that you cover it with adhesive lined heat shrink tube. The adhesive lined part is important. W/o that the heat shrink will only slow down the mud & grime from getting into the braid.

 

[UPS]

The mud & grime factor is one to think about. If you opt to use the braided I would highly suggest that you cover it with adhesive lined heat shrink tube. The adhesive lined part is important. W/o that the heat shrink will only slow down the mud & grime from getting into the braid.

WOW, wouldn't that be an expensive brake line job.

Mike

 

[BKinzey]

I also wonder how long heat shrink would last. It's not very flexible. Then again I haven't used adheasive heat shrink so maybe it's more flexible?

 

[mollyman]

Thanks for all the info. I was just thinking about the braided because it would be easier. But I didn't think about the crap getting into the braids. Question about the 14blt hard lines. Are they a different size than what would be on say a 12blt? Because if I order a full line kit it would be for a k10 but the 14blt would be from a k20, would this be a problem?

 

[ntsqd]

It would be spendy to cover the whole distance in adhesive lined HS and no if anything it is less flexible. Could use the HS at each end and run the braided thru something like fuel hose or truck air brake type nylon hose. Then the HS would just be needed to seal the ends.