OK This is where I'm going to post the brake line nightmare.

If you don't want to see swear words or get offended easily please leave now.  

I left all the pics HUGE to show detail.

Click to enlarge.

OK let me start in the beginning my '04 FJR with ABS has some very good brakes.

They weren't perfect but they were good.

I always thought they were a little mushy so I looked into a Galfer stainless steel brake line kit.

Pricey at about $400 for the kit but it included front and rear lines plus a bunch that went to the ABS pump so I figured it would be a worthwhile Farkle.

SS lines on a regular bike are a piece of cake so I looked that this kit and it looked just as easy but just more of it, I also had to be careful to follow procedure while bleeding the system but that's all in the manual supplement so I figured no problem.

The kit comes with no instructions but I've done this before so I should be OK. (A little more on this. I spoke to Robert at Galfer and he told me that they did an install on a bike in exchange for pics so they could write up an instruction sheet and the customer never took the pics. I have no idea why they didn't do it while it was in the shop.)

The only thing that got me a little lost was that the junction block included in the kit that replaces the kit above the front fender has different internal threads then everything else for some reason.

So your best bet is finding the 3 different banjo bolts and thread them into the junction block and set that aside until you’re ready for it.

I kept getting them mixed up with the other 9 banjo bolts since I thought they were all the same.

No big deal. I didn’t force anything so there was no harm.

Now back to the rest of the lines.

One line runs from the front master cylinder to a different junction block to the right of the steering head.  

Then a solid line runs from that pack to the ABS pump.  

Then a solid line runs from the ABS pump back up to the junction next to the steering head.

Now this isn’t really a junction since these two are separate but the two separate blocks bolt together so I'm gonna call it a junction for lack of a better word.

I removed the flare nut that connected the solid line to the block that went to the master.

It was a BITCH!

I figured that once it turned it would be easy to remove the rest of the way. NO DICE! It was a bitch right up until the last turn or two.

I checked it for lock tight and I can’t find a trace of anything.

Then I proceed to try and remove the bottom of the two lines.

That line went to the junction block just above the front fender.

It doesn’t budge.

I grab the block in a pair of Vice-Grips and it’s hard as hell to move and the FUCKING NUT ROUNDS OFF!!!

MOTHER FUCKER!!!

I call Nick (mechanic GURU and tool fetishist) and ask him what the deal is.  

He tells me I should have used a crow's foot socket or a flare nut wrench.

FUCK! Now I’m REALLY pissed at myself for screwing the pooch and not using the right tool.

I get to Sears and get the right flare nut wrenches and he lends me the crow’s foot socket.

I figure be careful, go easy, and it’ll go.

Guess what NO FUCKIN’ LUCK!!!

The flare nut is in pretty bad shape at this point so I grab it with a pair of Vice-Grips and lock them on pretty good and while holding on to the block with the other Vice-Grips I try to turn it and it’s not gonna go so I stop it.

That’s where I sit right now at 1 am on Wednesday December 22^nd.

If you’re reading this and are at all familiar with the FJR’s brake lines drop me a line with your ideas.

Catfish at CatfishRacing dot com  

Now we can either heat it to see if it goes, cut the hard line and re-flare the end (not much room for that) or maybe file the flats of the flare nut and try and use a 9 mm flare nut wrench and see what happens.

I’ll post more as it happens.

After that I decided that it would be good therapy to drill a hole in my fuel tank so I can add a bulkhead for my fuel cell. I’m going to write more on this back on my Farkles page.

Later.  

Well I tried to heat it tonight.

First I tried two layers of disposable cooking pans. 

That didn't work so I tried making one out of an old license plate.

No luck there either.

I really don't know what the fuck I'm gonna do.

Well, Nick looked at it again today and he concurred that it's FUBARed!

But on the plus side he told me if I can pull the line out to the engine bay he could cut the flare nut and block off and reflare the line and install a new flare nut so I could finish the kit.

That's my goal for this weekend.

Get that line through the frame.

More later.

OK so I stayed away from the FJR for a few days.

Not because I really wanted to but because of Christmas and work and the roads being covered with snow and ice and salt and all.

Nick's been super busy working on his house so he can move in so yesterday I went out and bought several different pieces of 3/16" brake line ranging from 8" to 5' from the local Napa (after Auto Zone didn't have it). I also picked up a couple of unions to go with that.

In the tool department I bought a single flare tool (it was cool but I can't use it for this application), a double flare tool, a tiny pipe cutter, a pipe bender, and a set of SAE flare nut wrenches 'cuz the 3/8" fit the flare nuts better then the 10mm one.

I came home from work today and cut one of the hard lines down and started flaring the ends just to practice. After about 3 or 4 I was ready to rock.

I went down to the garage, fired up the heater and cut the mauled brake line off

 and pulled it through the frame and into the engine compartment.

Here are a few pics as I cut the line back.

Basically I just did everything that Nick was going to do. I cut the rubber sleeve back and put on a new flare nut flared the end, then took the eight inch piece of new tube and bent it to come out pretty much where the old one used to but with a little more room.

This is what it looks like after I reflared the stock line and added a union and a new line that I bent to come out where the old line used to. The 4 lines in the kit that only have a banjo fitting at one end and have a female threaded fitting on the other end get threaded into the flare nuts. They get a small easy to lose brass insert between the flare nut and the threaded female end.

Well, I dropped one while trying to get the line from the master to one of those lines back in the front (not the one I made but the other one).

I'm waiting for a package from Galfer with a few of those new brass fittings.

They told me that they had no trouble sending me out another brass fitting since I didn't lie and say that they didn't include enough in the kit.

The kit calls for 4 and they ship it with 4. They are so small I think a couple of extras should be mandatory.

More to follow.

This page was last updated on:

07/24/2007