QUOTE(realred914 @ Nov 30 2010, 07:56 AM)
a littel bit of brake compatble grease on teh threads helps for the next time you need to remove the hoses, also works nice on bleeder screws to help make them easy to remove the next time. this is the stuff you are supposed to smear on teh piston and bore on teh outside of the sealed area to prevent sticking/corrosion. do NOT use regular grease, only use grease specifically made from brake rubber parts.
I'd say your fault,
with a car this old, you got a responsibility to give it a safety inspection when parts critical to safety are of unknown age, if the hoses had cracks, you maybe could have caught it in a safety inspection. you will now replace all brake hoses. leasons learned.
I wonder did you notice any reduction in braking prior to failure?
maybe one hose was leaking for a while, (maybe no rear brkaes at first) then the front hose went and you lost the entire system?
Or did both hoses fail at the same time???
always make it a point to check the resevoir level at each gas fill up, they made you have to open the trunk to fill with gas, might as well look at the resovoir too. I tend to do that at each fill up. Since these cars dont have a level sensor in teh resevoir as new cars do, a check at each fil up can catch small ealsk before they result in total failure.
good luck, drive safe!!!
The rubber hose did NOT fail, it had cracks, but what did fail was the steel flange on the hard-line from the caliper to the rubber hose. My contention is that this was not a predictable failure. The flair on the caliper side of the hard line was fine when I replaced the caliper.
As I stated earlier in this and many other threads, this car just has oddball crap failures.
To me it is not worth a complete 'frame off' style restoration to just have a driver grade car.
Have you all replaced all of the brake lines from stem to stern? The master cylinder? Had all four caliper rebuilt? New proportioning valve?
I mean give me a break here (pun intended). I am diligent at the safety and soundness stuff, replaced fuel lines, new tyres, better lights, ect. but to have the flair end of a hard line fail without warning is odd. That is what I was referring to as 'not my fault'