[BSD] There are more than one manufacturer of stainless steel wrapped teflon brake lines. One of them is Earl’s which makes aircraft approved brake lines with AN fittings. These fittings are meant to be "serviced" meaning taken on and off without damage. Just what you want for a race car. I can’t say what type the Russel or Goodrich (is that the right name?) lines are.
I think Comptech and RM Racing sell brake lines for about $200 made to fit your car (not Earl's). However, Brian's Racing will be happy to sell you Earl's lines made to fit your car exactly for $100.00 plus shipping. Or, if you are lucky, I'll just tell you the part numbers and you can order them yourself for about $60.00. :-)
The install for Brian's Brake Lines is as follows:
Front
Support car on jack stands. Remove wheels. Loosen 14mm banjo bolt holding brake line to caliper. Remove bolts holding brake line to brackets on suspension. Remove two 14mm bolts holding caliper to bracket. Clean area where flex brake line meets hard line. Remove U clip by grabbing it and pulling it towards you. The U clip is laying flat and the opening is on the inboard side. It has a lip on it for you to grab. You will re-use this. Loosen hard brake line end nut from flexible brake line. I used vice-grips on flex line and 10mm wrench on hard line end. You _should_ use 10mm flare end wrench on this end. Stripping or rounding this fitting will cause you _extreme_ pain and problems and delays and expense. Do NOT strip this nut or the threads. I warned you. (Use any "loosening" agent you have on it. I used WD-40 which may or may not have helped.) Also, make sure to use a good grip on the flex end of this joint. Relying on the bracket to hold it (you'll see what I mean) didn't work for some reason. But, vice-grips and 10mm worked great. Now you are ready to actually remove flex line. When you do, brake flid will start dripping from hard line. It will drip slowly but NEVER stop until the
entire brake fluid reservoir is empty. Cork or block this line from dripping if you can. Now, remove flex line completely from car and caliper. Throw away 2 crush washers on banjo bold end. You need to use new ones. Modify caliper as described below. Put caliper back on and attach hose. See below for hose issues.
Rear
Loosen 14mm banjo bolt. Clean area around hard line to flex line fitting. Remove U clip. Loosen 10mm nut into flex line. Be careful. I warned you twice. Remove plastic cover around parking brake cable (bottom back side of caliper.) Remove cotter pin clip thing holding parking brake cable end. (Make sure parking brake is not on. Your car is on jack stands, right!?) Remove two 12mm bolts holding parking brake to rear caliper. Remove two 14mm bolts holding caliper to bracket. Remove 14mm banjo bolt. Remove caliper. Remove flex brake line bolt (12mm). Remove flex brake line. Modify caliper (see below). Put caliper back on. Attach parking brake and plastic cover. Attach hose. See below for hose issues.
Modify Caliper
The Brian's Brake Lines (Earl's) have a different length banjo end than the stock brake lines. Look at where the banjo bolt attachs to caliper. There is a U shaped trough for the hose to go through on the way to the hole for the banjo bolt. This U is too narrow for Earl's banjo fitting. Take a drill to this to widen it. My largest bit is smaller than the gap so I wiggled my drill back and forth. Plug the hole with a paper towel or something appropriate so metal particles won't get in the caliper. Clean this area well. Make sure the brake line and banjo bolt will fit before trying this on the car. Use new crush washers when you install the banjo fitting. Leaks are bad. Old/used washers may leak.
Hose Issues
Brake lines should flex but NOT rub on anything. The stock lines are designed specifically to NOT rub. You should do whatever is necessary to keep your brake lines from rubbing. In the rear, I used a tie wrap. I put the tie wrap on the hose where it routes between the A-arms and through the axle end housing. I tied the tie wrap really tight on the hose and left about 1.5" of tie wrap sticking out. This sticking out piece goes around the inside of the gap in the axle housing (just lays there). It appears to keep the brake line from touching anything except the tie wrap. Note that the suspension moves up a lot from where it is now (hanging in full droop.) Take this into consideration. In the front, the problem is much worse. Not only does the suspension move up and down but the caliper and wheel move in and out (as the wheel turns.) Also, the line goes through several places and was held on in 2 places there originally. I removed my hose brackets from the car and used tie wraps again to hold my line away from stuff and away from the suspension. Find a way to keep the line from rubbing on anything.
When attaching the new SS lines to the hard line, make sure to attach the adapter female end to the brake line first. Then, put end of line up through bracket towards hard line. Tighten adapter to hose first. Then align hose towards caliper. Finally, tighten hard line to hose. This way worked best for me. Do you over tighten these lines. Once you have bled the brakes, after re-assembly, try pressing on brakes at full force. See if any fluid leaks from anywhere. Tighten those fittings more. Press again on brakes. Re-check. Re-check brake lines often.
Horror Story
The person I sold my Mustang to (which had stainless/teflon brake lines) had a major brake failure. The way I had my lines secured had the SS lines close to the hard lines in one area. The SS line eventually wore through the hard line and caused a total loss of braking to one wheel. This was on a car that went racing many times a year. Fortunately, the new owner was close to home and going slow.
Finally
Stainless brake lines are really a racing thing. They provide hardly any advantage for street use. They can be a liability, though. Consider them high maintenance and keep a close eye on them. Check for leaks, rubbing, wear, cracks, deformation, etc. They are part of the second most important safety feature of your car. (Steering #1 in my book.) Don't let "upgraded" lines cause problems for you.
Earl's Brake Lines
Front: 630102 18 (18", banjo, #3 AN)
Rear: 630102 24 (24", banjo, #3 AN)
Adapter: 989537 (#3 AN to 10mm x 1.0 pitch (aka Honda))
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