BerserkerCatSplat
Hormone Induced
This weekend I dug into the brakes again. I had tried a while back to install a set of stainless braided front lines, but discovered that no matter how much I soaked the 3/8 hard line fitting on the driver's side, it was seized solid to the hard line and trying to loosen it would just screw up the line. So I left it until I could find a replacement line from the junkyard as there's nowhere to get a new replacement line and one end has a metric bubble flare that I don't have the tool or the fitting to create.
At the same time, I changed the brake master cylinder reservoir. I recently installed a new master cylinder with reservoir (since my old reservoir was basically opaque with age), and only after installing it did I discover that the reservoir design (which is the same on all early-ZJ replacement master cylinders I could find online) is slightly different than the OEM one. Here's a post-removal comparison:
You can see that the grotty old one has much longer "legs" and sits at a different angle. Thus, if you use the aftermarket reservoir, it sits much lower and is tilted back towards the firewall a bit. I figured this wouldn't be an issue as I could still fill it just fine. And it did work OK, until I drove over a large speed bump and was treated to this sight:
That's fresh brake fluid pouring out of my fender. It turns out that if you hit a big bump, the aftermarket reservoir dumps a bunch of fluid from the front half into the back half, and the seal isn't enough to contain it, so it pours down the front of your brake booster and down the inner fender until it finds a hole. It also strips all the paint off the booster while it's at it.
So I found myself swapping the reservoir after emptying it out with a turkey baster as best I could without draining the actual master cylinder. Pain in the cunning linguals but I was going to do the hard line replacement anyway and pulling the reservoir off gave me better access to the hard line connection so I guess it all works out in the end. I put in a lower-mileage reservoir from the yard that was still an improvement over my old one.
Much better, but of course now I need to bleed that stupid ABS unit again.
At the same time, I changed the brake master cylinder reservoir. I recently installed a new master cylinder with reservoir (since my old reservoir was basically opaque with age), and only after installing it did I discover that the reservoir design (which is the same on all early-ZJ replacement master cylinders I could find online) is slightly different than the OEM one. Here's a post-removal comparison:
You can see that the grotty old one has much longer "legs" and sits at a different angle. Thus, if you use the aftermarket reservoir, it sits much lower and is tilted back towards the firewall a bit. I figured this wouldn't be an issue as I could still fill it just fine. And it did work OK, until I drove over a large speed bump and was treated to this sight:
That's fresh brake fluid pouring out of my fender. It turns out that if you hit a big bump, the aftermarket reservoir dumps a bunch of fluid from the front half into the back half, and the seal isn't enough to contain it, so it pours down the front of your brake booster and down the inner fender until it finds a hole. It also strips all the paint off the booster while it's at it.
So I found myself swapping the reservoir after emptying it out with a turkey baster as best I could without draining the actual master cylinder. Pain in the cunning linguals but I was going to do the hard line replacement anyway and pulling the reservoir off gave me better access to the hard line connection so I guess it all works out in the end. I put in a lower-mileage reservoir from the yard that was still an improvement over my old one.
Much better, but of course now I need to bleed that stupid ABS unit again.