Diy brake line: where to buy materials

Im needing to create some brake lines from scratch. I was wondering if anybody on here had made some lines and had tips.

Also trying to find a place to buy braided line if making lines isnt super hard.

Are we making hard lines or flex?

Just sell the car and save yourself the headache. Hardlines suck. But you can get line and connectors pretty much any parts store if you're truly masochistic.

Flex lines. Putting wilwood calipers on something that doesnt have a readily availible kit.

revrico wrote: Just sell the car and save yourself the headache. Hardlines suck. But you can get line and connectors pretty much any parts store if you're truly masochistic.

That's pretty drastic. With a few decent tools it's just another job to take care of.

You can obtain brake lines in various lengths with either the double flare or ISO (bubble) flare at auto parts stores. NAPA has the easily bendable lines in common diameters, assorted connectors and adaptors etc. DO NOT USE COMPRESSION FITTINGS to patch a brake line.

Making flares requires specialized tools and requires practice to produce good non leaking flares. I just completed replacing all brake and clutch lines on a TR3. I have also been making brake lines for 50 years.

If you want braided brake hoses, buy ready made hoses.

Any decent local auto parts store should be able to supply the hard lines by the roll. If you want to go mail order, Summit Racing or Jegs have the parts. Look for nickel-copper alloy lines, one brand name is NiCopp; it's much more resistant to corrosion and easier to bend and flare.

Flex lines are pretty straightforward. You can actually assemble your own with various adapters - use an NPT to -3 AN adapter on the caliper, an off-the-shelf -3 AN line, then whatever it takes to adapt your hard lines to AN at the other end. Yes, more failure points - but a good AN fitting isn't going to fail.

Cousin_Eddie wrote:

revrico wrote: Just sell the car and save yourself the headache. Hardlines suck. But you can get line and connectors pretty much any parts store if you're truly masochistic.

That's pretty drastic. With a few decent tools it's just another job to take care of.

To some maybe, but flaring is a skill I never got the hang of, and it seems to put in patches I always wind up replacing whole lines.

Hoses and flex lines I've not messed with, but the fact they can't kink in bizarre places should make them considerably easier.

The company that makes my braided brake lines uses a giant hydraulic crimper like this to make DOT legal lines

It has a pressure tester built in to make sure they will not fail.

I pay about 25 a line and they are made while I wait with whatever fittings I want to whatever length I tell them. I consider it cheap insurance.

Look for your local industrial hydraulic vendor.

Flaring isn't that difficult if you do the right prep to the line first. It's got to be cut straight and chamfered in and out. Then make sure your tool is on straight and don't let it slip. A quality tool will make it easier to do a good job.

Hard lines you can get all the consumables at any parts store, just bring part numbers, a lot of the counter guys at the worse stores know NOTHING about that stuff. I once had a guy bring me a compression union (which is not for brake line pressures) when I asked for a M10x1.5 bubble flare union, he then told me "all 3/16 brake line stuff is the same" when he came back with a SAE union.

Flex lines, pay the man (I think NAPA will do it, call ahead) to make them for you or use AN like Keith said.

With the Wilwood caliper, he's committed to the NPT-AN adapter at the caliper already - unless there are some variants I haven't met yet.

Most Dyna-lites I've gotten just had the 1/8 npt tapped hole it was up to the buyer to adapt from there.
I've made SS / Teflon flex lines its not hard but does require proper tools and time, Both I normally have. But I no longer waste my time I simply pick up a catalog for any race supplier and order what I need.
For example. 1) Bolt on your caliper.
2) Run a string or a wire the way you wish to route the line.
3) double check line will not pinch at full look in each direction, including droop and compression. 4) Find stock line mount on body / strut note shape of hole. 4b) if cars been de-tabbed order tabs 5) go to catalog look up flex line. brake parts page of catalog

stuart in mn wrote: Look for nickel-copper alloy lines, one brand name is NiCopp; it's much more resistant to corrosion and easier to bend and flare.

This fellow speaks the truth. The alloy lines are soooo much better to work with.

logdog wrote:

stuart in mn wrote: Look for nickel-copper alloy lines, one brand name is NiCopp; it's much more resistant to corrosion and easier to bend and flare.

This fellow speaks the truth. The alloy lines are soooo much better to work with.

Yes, this stuff is the E36 M3. It's a little bit pricier but it is worth it. Did all the fuel lines and brake lines in our duallie out of the stuff. The lines looked OEM, as far as the bends went, and fell right in line with all the clips and fittings.

If you think you are going to be doing a lot of flaring in the future, get a hydraulic flaring tool, like Mastercool's. Extremely fast and makes absolutely perfect flares. It's kind of spendy, but if you live in an area where brake lines are the first thing to go on a car, then it's a good buy.

These guys used to have an advert in GRM. Fed Hill

+1 on the copper/nickel line. When I did the ABS conversion & master cylinder replacement in my Miata, I used Fed Hill's "cunifer" line to make the new lines. I also cut, re-bent, and re-flared a single factory steel hard line (the one that goes from front to rear) and the cunifer was several times easier to work with.

I used a Bluepoint flaring tool that looks like the HF one, but actually works. It's a bit tricky to use right, but it does work. Later when helping out with a friend's car I had a chance to use a hydraulic flaring tool like the one Eastwood sells, and the next time I need to make brake lines I'm buying one of those.

I think the stock Miata lines are SS. They are a bitch to flare. Regular steel tube from Napa is easier.

The man said he needs flex lines, why you still talkin hard lines.

Nick (LUCAS) Comstock wrote: The man said he needs flex lines, why you still talkin hard lines.

This is the internet. We have focus issues.

Because that question's been answered.

44Dwarf wrote: These guys used to have an advert in GRM. Fed Hill

This. I do not know where this was all my life.

In reply to 44Dwarf:

Looks perfect. Thanks!

Keith Tanner wrote: I think the stock Miata lines are SS. They are a bitch to flare. Regular steel tube from Napa is easier.

I guess that's to stop them rusting?

The bluepoint tool had no problem flaring the stock NB line, but I did that one last so I'd had a bunch of practice by that point.