HEL Brake Lines

There you have it: Board member finally tells us to go to HEL! At least for brake lines...

Can I ask: What did they charge for a set? And these were for your '83 308?

Thanks!

 

Just ordered a set. My car pulls to the right under braking. I am going to have to pull off the calipers and see what is going on in there, so this is a great time to deal with the old brake lines.

This whole Ferrari thing is turning out to be a lot of fun. Huh. Who'da thunk it?

 

Last month at the local British car show there was a vendor with a display of SS brake lines that he makes for MG, Triumph, Austin Healey etc. I asked if he could make some up for a 308, he didn't think that it would be a problem.

No personal experience with the vendor but he did display a lot of nice Brit car upgrades.

TS Imported Automotive - British Car and Parts Sales Pandora, Ohio

 

I sent HEL a cut-and-paste of this entire thread, so hopefully they will get it right.

It seems that we have the same problem: the car pulls to the right under braking. The first thing I did was bleed the brakes on that side. The fluid was no longer clear, but it had no air in the lines, either. I gave it a modest bleed to see if that would help, and maybe it did a little.

This car was very much under-used for the past few years and it may just be that exercising it is helping. My next step is to pull off the calipers and work the pistons back and forth a bit to see what is going on. Since that's the plan, I figured that replacing the lines is a sensible step at that point--they are 30 years old and don't look so great anymore.

Keep us posted, Brad. I'll be interested to hear if you get anywhere with this problem.

Thanks!

 

I had a similar problem, complicated by a leaking passenger rear caliper so I pulled and rebuilt all four. It was a fairly straight forward task. Once completed, and the pads bedded in, she stops straight and quite a bit quicker than before. The right front caliper had a LOT of build-up on the bore and pistons that I am pretty certain was causing an issue.

I got the ATE kits from PMB Performance along with a great set of carbon/kevlar pads that I really like. They have a re-plating service for a very reasonable rate to replace the zinc plating on the calipers that is sacrificial to oxidation over the years. If you get into it and have any questions feel free to shout. I have complete pics of the whole tear down, rebuild and re-installation for all four corners. Did the brake hoses and front wheel brgs and seals while I was in there.

Paul

 

I got the two front HEL replacement lines installed and the issue with pulling to the right under braking has resolved itself. I pulled off the left front caliper and gave it a good look, but couldn't really find any issues. The problem seems to have been related to the line itself. I cut the old line in half, but there was no apparent flaw or collapse, so the mystery kind of remains.

Installing the new lines is a bit of a pain but not really that hard to do. The challenge is that the inboard connection is positioned such that you can't really turn a wrench very far before you run out of room. Also, prying out the inner fitting retaining clip (it holds the connection between the soft and hard lines to the car) is challenging. You need to slowly and carefully lever it out with a flat bladed screwdriver. The problem is that there is really no way to see what you are doing, so you are working blind.

My one word of caution on this job would be to make sure that you have a proper set of line wrenches--you do NOT want to round off the fittings using an open-ended wrench. It's hard enough to get this job done without creating more problems for yourself.

Last note: if you really need to get at the inboard side of the inner fittings, you might be able to access them by removing the battery and going in through the battery cover.

 

re: inner front securing nuts... 24mm (15/16inch) crows foot socket with a long extension from the wheel well FTW!

 

Totally. I have every tool know to man. Except that.