Brake Pipe Routing

[Guest Paul Gretton]

Call me stupid, but even after 20 odd years as a mechanic I can't decide on the best routing to fit the front to rear brake pipe in my Sub K.

 

Starting from the rear T piece, should I run it along the centre tunnel tube tops up to where the gear lever/dashboard bottom is and then along inside the footwell panel (gearbox side) and up to the master cylinder. My tunnel top/bulkhead is not yet fitted.

 

Also, has anyone tried using an inline pressure limiter such as that from a MK3 Fiesta connected directly to the master cylinder. I think that to locate and accurately adjust the Sierra inertia type will be a pain in the you know what.

 

All ideas gratefully appreciated.

 

Paul.

[Guest Guy]

Hi Paul,

 

Well I put my tunel together befor I relised I hadn't put anything inside it!

 

I took the drivers side off again and routed the 2 fule pipes and break pipe through it and used P-clips to secure them to the inside of the pasenger tunnel side. They go round the left side of the gearbox and disapear into there respective locations.

 

I also put a 20mm diamiter PTFE pipe in with cable ties that runs from the engine bay to the back of the tunnel so I can route the electrics through it, then I put the side of the tunnel back on. I can get the wires through the pipe by sucking some string through it with a vachume cleaner.

 

I fitted the pressure limiter from the sierra but on reading other posts I may take it out. I have rear drums and front disks and apparentley as drums are not as good as the front disks it passes the break test anyway, so if I have the valve in then I may loose rear break effot on heavy deceliration. This wouldn't show up on a pressure test as the car is stationery!

[Guest Ant]

On the brake and fuel lines watch where you put them at the back. Before fitting my seat back panel I attached the lines to the chassis, and got them nice and neatly in the gap between the de-dion tube and the chassis tubes. This is an SVA fail point. They don't believe me that the de-dion tube is rigidly mounted. Given the rubber mounts at the front (and ignoring the hard bolts) they claim that it will flex slightly under load, and as such may trap the fuel and brake lines. I've moved them now, but it's a bit of a pain as the seat back panel is now in the way.

 

Another consideration is a prang which impacts on one of the rear wheels. Potentially this de-dion tube could be shoved to one side, and then it may hit the pipes, so they need moving on that front too.

 

I have seen cars with the brake pipes attached to the de-dion tube rather than to the chassis tubes on other people's cars. This would definitely be a fail point with Alf at Derby!

 

Ant

[Guest Feek]

I have seen cars with the brake pipes attached to the de-dion tube rather than to the chassis tubes on other people's cars. This would definitely be a fail point with Alf at Derby!

 

Curses!

 

Guess what I've just attached the T-piece to!? D'oh!

 

BTW - great feedback from the SVA test, lots of useful points! Best of luck for the re-test...

 

Cheers.

[Guest Paul Gretton]

Thanks all for the replies everyone , all appreciated.

 

I had already put the rear pipes, flexis and T piece in and attached them to the chassis not the subframe. I decided to run the f to r pipe as I had first thought and not use pressure limiter as car has front 2 litre vented discs and feeble 1.6 litre small rear drums.

 

I have put a jointing piece in the brake pipe at the front where it emerges from tunnel so that if a limiter has to be fitted at a later date it will not need the whole f to r pipe to be removed. I am going to run everything up the top of the centre tunnel and hope and pray that I don't drill through it when putting the top on! I like a high armrest!!!!!!!!

 

Now putting in rear wiring loom, spare wheel mountings etc before battling with fuel tank.

 

Cheers everyone

 

Paul.

[Jon Bradbury]

I too have routed my fuel pipe in this way, but on my chassis (DOHC "Lux"... huh??) the deDion tube isn't mounted using the rubber bushed lugs. It is bolted rigidly with the trailing arm outer bolts and the differential rear mount bolts. Does this give me a strong case for declaring rigidity or will I be back to the drawing board with the pipes?

 

Getting worried now..

[Guest Feek]

Jon,

 

Sounds similar to the Sub-K, but I wonder if there is a difference in what's done with the rubber mounts?

 

Here's what the video says for the Sub-K:

 

Though you chop the "lugs" off the top of the big round rubber mounts at the front outer ends of the DD tube, the remaining slab of rubber is squeezed up onto the floor panel when you bolt everything up. That said, the actual bolt holding on the fron tof the DD tube goes through the floor, and the top metal part of the DD mounting section - where you had to open up the void to get the nut in.

 

The outer trailing arm mounting bolts then go through the chassis brackets too.

 

A bolt or two secures the diff itself onto a plate that hangs down from the chassis.

 

Ergo, only the front two mounts could be even remotely moveable - but that may be enough to worry SVA??? However, without the rubber, it seems to me that it would all be pretty rigid...

 

How does the DOHC Lux mount the front lugs then (do you remove the rubber bits)??

 

Cheers.

[Guest Ant]

Your DOHC lux setup sound exactly like the standard 2B setup. I did try to explain to my tester that the de-dion tube is rigidely bolted to the chassis via the trailing arm bolts and the differential unit, but he wasn't having any of it. Basically I decided not to argue it too much as my pipe was quite simple to move and only required 2 new P clips and a bit of a shove. Best not to go "point proving" on an SVA test.

 

Ant

[Guest Julian B]

Hi

 

I routed every thing through the tunnel. I used the sierra deceleration valve but placed it in the rear on an adjustable bracket. All brakes were stripped and rebuilt using new linings with new disks aswell on the front. I have never had to adjust the deceleration valve angle and the front wheels lock up as you would expect when stamping on the brakes.

[Jon Bradbury]

Feek,

 

The DOHC kit does away with the rubber mounts entirely in order that the recessed floor can be fitted (this in turn allows you to make use of the driver's side height adjustment on the supplied Recaro seats). So what we have for the de-dion tube is three rather questionable mount points; to whit : outer trailing arm bolts x2 and the diff rear bolts (also x2 but I had to flex the rear of the chassis down to achieve this, so now the petrol tank doesn't quite sit right.. <sigh>). The hump in the de-dion tube actiually contacts the hassis on one side. I am toying with the idea of welding lugs to the chassis and de-dion tube and bolting them together, as I am not altogether happy that the three point setup is strong enough.

 

Cheers

 

JonB