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... i hear that mushy-ness can be fixed by upgrading to steel brake lines...
Contrary to popular belief, steel braided lines do NOT make the pedal firmer than regular rubber armored lines that are in good condition. I used to know the engineer who ran the NASCAR brake program for Performance Friction (PF made the brakes on almost all of the race cars) and he was telling me this several years ago. He said that the reason racing vehicles use the lines with the braided exterior covering is that they are more resistant to being torn away by flying debris, etc. He said that the braid does not have anything to do with the swelling of the line (which makes sense once you think about it). He said that if you change fluid, pads, and do a good bleeding of the brake system, you will detect NO difference in the firmness of the pedal regardless of whether you have a "braided" line or a good rubber-armored line. I happened to have a near-new 300ZXTT at that time (a car with marginal brakes from the factory relative to the performance potential). I had already bought braided lines, AXXIS pads, and Motul fluid for it but hadn't installed them at the time I was talking to my PF engineer acquiaintance. I then changed the fluid and pads, did a thorough bleeding, and the pedal felt great (by 300ZXTT standards) -- firm and predictable. I changed the lines and there was zero difference that I could detect.
Bottom line, it's the other things that are almost always improved/corrected at the time of a braided brake line install that makes people think they lines themselves made a big difference.
Here in the dry desert, the outer sheath on the hoses on my LX cracked at 4 yrs old. Hoses were still good since they weren't buldging (that's the sign they are about to burst). The desert is harsh on any rubber. Anyways, I installed stainless braided hoses. Also ran stainless braided hoses on my 4runner for 7 yrs before selling it. No issues. So in this respect, I claim the stainless is more durable in harsh desert environments. As far as feel, I'd say they feel a tad firmer, but that could be because the older hoses were...old. At least the covered stainless is less suceptible to cracking over rubber hoses. Hey, if it helps, I noticed the SR-71 spy plane in the local air & space museum has stainless braided hoses! I guess at mach 3.0, rubber hoses would melt.
02-15-10, 06:07 AM
I guess at mach 3.0, rubber hoses would melt.
