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I am thinking about brake lines again - anyone familiar with the copper/nickel type

3K views 24 replies 15 participants last post by  ccduke 
#1 · (Edited)
#2 ·
I would recommend going with stainless, Some people say it's hard to work with, but I totally disagree with that. I did the whole car in one day and bent everything by hand.
 

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#3 ·
When restoring my Z/28, I went all stainless; but they were pre-bent. I have zero experience bending to fit.

When I needed just one brake line in the front of my 49 Studebaker, I used the copper nickel, and that line was super easy to bend. I have not heard of any down side. Does someone make pre-bent stainless brake lines for the Opel GT?
 
#4 ·
Lynn,
I believe that OGTS makes them cut to length but not pre-bent they includes all of the connectors and yes there are steel, can't recall if they are stainless or not, think they are, would be kind of hard to ship pre-bent. Anyway, I have been doing more studying on the cooper nickel lines and they seem to make sense due to the amount of pressure they can handle and the fact that the material is basically rust free. The fact that you can actually bend it by hand is also attractive however Heilman said he could bend the stainless steel by hand, I guess I am not eating my Wheaties as I was unable to do that. I would love to have the stainless steel for aesthetics but found steel just to hard to bend with the engine, etc, all in place. Thinking the cooper/nickel will be easier to bend and get it in place. Using stainless for the main line to the back of the car and the rear wheels I don't believe would pose a major issue as everything is easily accessible, its those two front wheels that are going to be difficult and I am looking for a way to level the playing field. My brake lines actually appear to be in pretty good shape, no visible rust on the outside, but don't know what is going on regarding the inside, so this project at the moment is not a priority but feel like since I replaced the master cylinder and the brake booster that it may be prudent to go ahead and either replace the calipers-or rebuild, replace the brake lines, and the rubber hoses as well. In the scheme of things brakes are pretty important, if everything works correctly and they don't, well..........................Thanks, Carl
 
#6 ·
I've bought OGTS's brake line set for my new car, like I did for my GTX car, and I'll be straightening them out, then rebending them for the car, with a pair of plier-like tubing benders. First time doing such a thing. The GTX had it's lines stripped before I got it, so had to guess where to put the bends as I went along. Start at the heels and work your way back to the MC is the basic rule. Luckily, I was able to strip off my new car's lines with minimal bending, so I should be able to copy the old and prebend the new lines in my basement before installing. On a totally stripped car. Man, it would be really hard to bend and install new front lines with the engine in the car. I don't envy your task.
 
#9 ·
Copper/Nickel (aka "Kunifer", at least in Germany), is the way to go. Do't worry about bending them, the cheapest bending tool from Harbor Freight will do the job with ease. Stainless steel lines are much harder to bend. Trust me, I know :sick:

Dieter

433222
 
#11 ·
Copper/Nickel is great for making up brake lines, it is easy to bend and it don't rust. The benders are cheap and about fool proof however the place to spend your money is the flairing tools and fittings if you want a first class job that is not going to leak. I don't trust compression fittings and doing patch jobs on brake lines, but I'm old school and believe in doing the job right using the right tools when it comes to brakes, hoses, wiring and such things so as not to get bite with failure in some remote place at the worse time.
 
#14 ·
This probably won't pertain to 99% of the people here. But if you are replacing brake lines and ever plan to upgrade your brakes or master cylinder to non stock parts, Instead of using inverted flare fittings on your lines you might consider using female AN3 fittings, AN adapter fittings are available in any shape or thread you might encounter, so a future brake upgrade would require nothing more then a fitting change instead of having to re-flare or change lines.
 
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#18 ·
No they don't replace the Banjo fittings, But just like any other fitting you might need you can get banjo fittings that work with the AN female fittings. Although my clutch line is AN4 you can see the female AN fitting connected to a male Banjo fitting on my clutch master cylinder in the pic I posted earlier in this thread. It's the exact same setup for AN3 fittings.
 
#16 ·
I look at the issue of SS vs copper nickel in this frame of mind: which one could be easily bent shut by accident or by running into something below the car? If you can bend it by hand, then that means it will take less effort to pinch it closed. Sure, that might never happen anyways but if my objection to a part is simply that it will take more effort on my part... sounds like I'm cutting corners.

The trick to figuring out any hardline bends before putting it on the car, is to use some solid wire to lay it out first. Get some 18 gauge single stranded wire and bend it to the shape you need. Then bend the hardline to match. I haven't used this trick myself yet, but it was too good to forget.
 
#17 ·
Trust me... as an old rally guy.... most things that hit up under the car that are big enough and that hit in a way that will 'get' a brake line will close up any line type you put under there! Kinda like big rocks getting oil pans....LOL. The only way to really prevent that is to put the lines inside the car. (BTW, brake fluids are flammable... but silicone types appear to be less so.)

As for the AN fittings, if you first connect your new lines with AN end fittings into the stock parts, you will need some AN to standard flare adapters as noted (except for a banjo fitting). These adapters are readily available but take up an inch or so of length, so be sure to put in a bit of an extra loop near the component, so you will have the needed hard line length if/when you put in an ugraded AN connected component.
 
#19 ·
Trust me... as an old rally guy.... most things that hit up under the car that are big enough and that hit in a way that will 'get' a brake line will close up any line type you put under there! Kinda like big rocks getting oil pans....LOL.
True, but I'm also thinking of tools. If I can bend it by hand, just my luck I'd drop a wrench that hit the hardline just right and pinched it shut. Or maybe even worse, my OCD will not like wavy lines. If I can bend it by hand, then that means I'll mess it up on accident all the time. Yes, many won't care.
 
#25 ·
I worked on the lines today a little bit. I worried about the long line running front-to-rear. Looked online and found that Eastwood sells a straightener for 90 bucks (Nope!). Went to Amazon and found some nylon wheels for 3D printers (here) and made up a little straightener, using a couple of youtube videos as inspiration, a block of oak left over from a dovetail box project, and a few screws I had lying around. Worked pretty good to straighten the 3-foot piece, we'll see how it does on the long front-to-rear piece. I'm sure that the copper-nickel lines are much easier to work with in this way than steel would be. I started by getting it just in-the-ballpark straight, then ran it back and forth through the wheels until it was pretty close to straight. It'll work for me. I think if I add another wheel on top and bottom, it'll do even better.

-Carson

433392
 
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