I was planning on doing a detailed
write-up of how I rebuilt my brakes but why re-invent the wheel.
Buckeye Triumphs has decided to put all of their terrific
technical articles back on line and they had a better brake
section then I could ever hope to do. I do, of course, have some
pictures to clarify a few steps of the process.
The only disappointment I had with
this project was with the POR-15 Caliper paint. I've had
terrific results with their other products but the yellow paint
just didn't give me the coverage that I was hoping for. It took
me 5 coats to get the yellow to cover most of the silver base
coat they have you put on first and it still shows through a
little on raised edges. I finally decided that once the alloys
are back on the car, no one will probably even notice.
Rebuilt Calipers from TS Imports
All
assembled on the work bench
Cylinder & Adjuster in place
E-Brake arm goes in after 1st locking plate
Two views of the 1st
plate
The second plate slides
on from the opposite direction and locks to the tabs
of the first plate. Once
I had the second plate on, I installed the black
dust cover that you can barely see here. The Buckeye
article said to install it after the 1st plate but I
found it stayed in place better with the 2nd plate
on.
While the first two
plates can be pushed on by hand, the locking plate
needs to be driven on with
a hammer and a punch or screwdriver. Now make sure
the cylinder can still slide back and forth.
A
better view of the dust seal.
This
is the grease I used.
And here's my
Oops for the rear drums. I didn't even realize that I had
made a mistake until I was installing the back plate on the
car. I did the left side first which was no problem but when
I did the right side, the top spring got in the way of the
nut. It took me a while to figure out what was wrong.
Evidently there's a right and a wrong way to install the top
spring. That spring has a short spring section and a long
spring section with a space in the middle. That space is
there so that the spring doesn't rub on the rubber cylinder
cap.
This
one is backward and the spring will rub
Here's
how it should look
I also found it's
much easier to install the brake pipe to the cylinder off
the car. I screwed it in snug and then backed it off a
little so the pipe could rotate. I slid it all in place as a
unit (back plate & pipe). Because the inner connection is to
a flexible hose, it's pretty easy to line everything up and
tighten it down.
So this complete brake overhaul
included the following with the majority of the parts coming
from
Ted Schumacher of TS Imports:
Rebuilt
Calipers
Rebuilt Servo
New Master
Cylinder (last summer)
Oversized
rear cylinders
Kevlar pads
and shoes
Braided brake
hose
All new
springs and clips in the rear
All told I
disconnected about 24 brake connections which had me
concerned about leaks during re-assembly. When the bleeding
moment of truth came, I had 5 leaks and 4 of those were
fixed by a little extra wrench. The 5th one required taking
the left front line apart & doing some cleaning which fixed
the problem.
It'll be another
couple of weeks before I can drive the car to test the new
brakes but I'm anxious to see if I got the big improvement I
am hoping for.
