Hard brakes.......!

My wife and I just bought a great old '65 Chevy that we fell in love with.

Its a daily driver that has a host of little things that will need fixed as we go.

My first concern is the brakes, after everything warms up the pedal gets harder and harder to the point where its even dragging the brakes a little. The previous owner said he thought it was the master cylinder, which I have a spare of. Does this make sense? Is the master cylinder swap pretty straight forward?

thanks!

mark in Portland Oregon

Scott-

Thanks for the info. Where do I get the lines, and is there a rebuild kit available for the wheel cylinders? I don't mind doing the work. How much money are we talking here for the parts?

mark in Portland

THanks for all the great info.

Whats the benefit of having the double master cylinder? I've got a functional single one I was going to use. I don't have a ton of $$.
And you mentioned the rear cylinder part #'s, what about the front?
If I stuck with the single just for now how much of the same brake line in the diagram would I need?

thanks!

mark in Portland

The advantage of having a dual master cylinder is safety. It is two separate reservoirs, one for front, one for rear. In the odd case of something in the system springing a leak, if you have a single reservoir you now have NO BREAKS, verses a double reservoir, you have HALF BREAKS. It is kind of a "MUST" upgrade.

Yeah it makes sense.

NAPA has a new double MC for $38.

Questions is, as to the diagram above, is there a pre-bent kit available or do I need to get all that stuff seperate?

And I can use the same front wheel cylinders but need different ones on the rear?

thanks!

mark

I had an International P/U that did that. It turned out to be to little free play in the pedal assembly. It was a quick adjustment and the brakes were fine after that.

Question is: what are the pros/cons of getting the rebuild kit for the wheel cylinders (much cheaper) as opposed to the new cylinders?

I actually pick the van up next week so I can't check as to weather or not its an early or later '65.

I'm gonna get the new MC from NAPA, all the metal lines/fittings shown above, figure out the wheel cylinder business, what else would I need? I've never done this much work on any brake system before so this will be a good learning experience!!

What is the "brake line hose" that NAPA shows on its site? They don't have the hard lines listed, just this hose for front and back........

thanks for all the help!

mark in Portland

Well I've learned alot about this van in the last few days, actually now I'm thinking I should have held out for a later van with more updated brake system but this van just captivated us......!

So alot of things will be answered when I get the van and can get under the thing to see whats things look like.

As far as basic safety, if I upgrade the MC and keep the rest stock, as in drums all around, am I at least pretty good for putzing around town? This is really the rig for getting my music gear to the shows and maybe to the beach/camping once in awhile, I don't drive in heavy traffic etc.

Thanks so much for all the info so far!

mark in Portlan

So, I can get the dual MC listed on the NAPA catalog for $38 (the one listed for the post '67 vans), plus new wheel cylinders (the two listed on the chart above for the rear plus whatever the fronts are), new drums, new E-brake stuff will be needed too.

What I need to know is: besides the 3 rubber hoses and all the metal lines and accessories shown in the chart above, what else do I need? I've read about some valve I might need? And do I need to cut the metal lines to fit? I'm a real novice with brakes!! I've done tons of other work but never did anything more than pad/rotor stuff with brakes........

thanks!

mark

Yeah but I don't think I can take mine in for the core trade because mine is single and I want the double, right?

Oh, and Napa lists only 2 hoses total for front and back not three.......???

thanks!

mark

The front hose are not a left and right, thats why the one listing of for front. You will need 2 fronts and 1 rear.

For future reference, how do you guys bleed the system? I used a hand vacuum pump.

If I need two of the brake hoses for the front and one for the rear, why does NAPA charge twice the price for one of the fronts??

Oh and Donivan, is the pic you listed earlier in this post with all the brake line parts and #'s coincide with the last post you made, that conversion? If so then what do you use the 3rd 60" piece of brake line for? I'm just on a tight budget so I don't want to get anything extra.....!

mark in Portland

Hey Donivan, the brake rod adjustment comment earlier, do you think that's why the brakes get really hard?

mark

These bleeder screws with a check valve in them help a lot when bleeding brakes by yourself. I've found them in the HELP section of auto parts stores.

ViewMaster wrote:These bleeder screws with a check valve in them help a lot when bleeding brakes by yourself. I've found them in the HELP section of auto parts stores.

Thanks. Looks like that can be very helpful.

With the master cylinder so close the to the wheel cylinder height, gravity bleeding is out of the question. I spent a good amount of time trying to get mine bled.