Holy bad brake lines!

Just under two years ago (10/10/05) I replaced all the rubber brake lines with new ones. The old ones still looked OK but I knew they were probably at least a dozen years old. Today I'm changing out the rotors and pads and take a look at the hoses I put on less than two years and the driver's side hose had very deep dry cracking. Judging by the looks of it it could have gone at any time. Luckily I had a spare set that came wth Brit-tek's brake kit, but it put a good scare in me. The passenger side looked fine. In the past two years I've probably only put about 3,000 miles on the car and it's always been garage stored. I know there have been problems recently with rubber trim bits, but brake lines...yikes!!!

If you've done these in the past couple years please take a quick peek...I'd hate to lose a friend!

Six words. Use stainless steel braided brake hoses. You'll never, I believe, ever have that problem with them. Someone please chime in if I'm wrong. :D

Shawn Escue

the disadvantage of stainless braided hoses (I use them myself!) is that they will not show this degradation. They could be complete mush inside but will look fine...unless abraded.

I'm beginning to think that unless one really needs the pressure resistance of the Goodridge lines (and i cannot see how a street car would, unless one acts as stupid as I did 40 years ago<ahem!> which i can no longer condone given I barely managed to survive many incredibly stupid moves).

Bottom line. the flex lines are a replacement item that should be replaced at about 2 years along with the fluid. Whether steel flex or pain old plain old. Have I done it yet? No. I have the parts, though...and will replace the steel lines with plain ones.

You may be right, but why wouldn't the rubber go bad anyway even with the stainless steel covering, and how can you ever inspect them? How would you ever know if they are getting ready to go bad?(just wondering)

I'm going to check mine out tomorrow. I was planning on replacing them this Spring (car will be stored for the Winter). I installed mine either in 2000 or 2001. I can't believe they went bad like that in two years. I'd let the vendor know about it. Where did you order them? Moss, VB? I think mine were from Moss. Please don't tell me you were using silicone brake fluid. Thanks for the heads up.

If you have in your garage a H2O heater or a furnace they will make ozone and that will contribute to rubber rot. I was told this by the engineers from Dunlop tires. I had this problem with my tires.

FWIW I am looking at some Nitto DOT competition tires for the TR. They have a warning not to store them below 32 degrees and show pics of the cracking that will occur. I don't have heated storage and am wondering if that may be a factor in my windshield rubber cracking. Perhaps some of these hoses are made out of similar rubber? Just can't seem to buy anything these days as good as what came on the car original. Not just these old cars either.

Mac, I hear ya. Talking to a friend the other day about old times. He says, Guys always say they wish they could go back & be 25 again. He says, Heck,not me, We're lucky we made it through the first time alive! LOL

Yikes man! Is it that desert heat?! Maybe you need to move back to NY! lolol!

Glad you found that!

Swamper nailed it. Most any electric motor produces Ozone, the larger the unit, the more decay, like perhaps a two-stage honkin' huge compressor. More likely a furnace or something that runs full time is the culprit.

Just got done checking mine as best I could thru wheel well with flashlight and by feel. They appear to still be okay, no cracks. Not bad for being seven years old. I still will replace them in the Spring after Winter storage.

Normally aren't there warning signs before one of these hoses fail? Mushy brakes due to a hose getting soft ? Or do they just fail suddenly? This case appears to be the exception to the norm, cracking like that after only 2 years. Is the car a daily driver or did it sit a lot?

Okay, had to go back and re-read the post. The car did a lot of sitting and maybe the desert dry heat had something to do with it. Still seems premature though. Mine seem okay(now I'm going to jinx myself) after seven years of daily driving in Florida heat and high humidity. Still will replace in Spring. I've had enought of the greasy side for this season. Think I'll do the clutch hose also. I've run silicone brake fluid all that time, would that have anything to do with the hoses holding up? Probably not.

No heater in the garage (don't need it in Arizona). It was in New York up t a year ago and then we moved and it's been in Arizona since. I thought maybe with the dry heat it could be a factor...but it's only been here a year so I'm pretty sure it just comes down to a defectve hose. The one on the passenger side did not have the same checking (but I replaced it anyways).

I'm not running silicon brake fluid...been running Castrol LMA through the system. Brakes didn't feel abnormal, I knew the pads and rotors were pretty old and there was a fair amount of scoring on the rotors and that was the reason for digging into it...quite a surprise!

Unfortunately the car has done a lot of sitting since we moved...summer heat is leaving though so our driving season is starting shortly!

Might not be your fault...could have been stored improperly at the place where you bought them. And perhaps that is not the cause at all, just food for thought.

I bought a pair of waders once that looked ok in the box. Since I wear a 14, you can imagine that for a long time they were on a top shelf in a back room that had a number of devices running in it. First time I wore them they started failing. The manufacturer was kind enough to replace them and explained to the dealer the concept of proper storage. Ozone kills rubber and a number of synthetic substitutes.

Original hoses lasted many years, without problem.
Standard OE recommendations were always to replace all hoses & seals every three years or 30,000 miles. Nobody did it.
Replacements are highly variable = CRAP QC! 1 year to who knows?
The outer layer of rubber is to protect the inner braid; the fluid tube is inside that.
There is no necessary correspondence between the condition of the three components.
When the braid was cotton, cracking of the outer was lethal; braids are now polyester, and the outer is more to prevent abrasion than for rot. Trouble is, once it's cracked, you don't really know what's under that.
All the Mazda hoses I have around here look as new, no cracks; and I'm reasonably sure they are original, c90-92. Those on my 89 Dodge truck are original and fine - wish I could say the same for the steel pipes!
So, the entire business appears to be a matter of aftermarket suppliers not keeping up with current technology.

SS braided hoses are generally teflon lined, with the steel braid over that. I've never seen one with any rubber in it, though I haven't looked at many since they have become more common. As long as these are not kinked or stretched, they may last forever.

FRM