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Post by buildercg on Nov 10, 2016 21:30:18 GMT
This week was a lot of running around with not much done. Got my wheel and tires mounted, then decided I need ARP stud ( should have just listened to Colin .. doH! ) so that's ordered. Last night got my old studs pressed out so its ready to go, now I'm thinking of repacking the bearing with racing grease while I wait. Also am about to start on doing the brake / fuel lines, so have a few questions about that job. Are we supposed to use the same 3/16 cunifer lines for both brake / fuel ? I noticed while under the car removing the ebrake that the 3 fuel lines on my 93 seem to be bigger than the 1 brake line going toward the rear. What is the best way to do this ? Shape the lines one at a time first before cutting and flaring ?I purchased Exomotive's fuel line kit for my car. The flexible lines made it relatively easy to install the 2 fuel line though it seems that the two runs provided by Exomotive have slack in them that make the lines unnecessarily long (I had to wrap my lines a bit as I don't have replacement ends and I didn't want to trim them). I am running a fuel cell though, so the slack may not exist when using the stock Miata fuel tank. For the brake line, I hand formed a single run for the master cylinder to the rear. Given this was my first time bending lines, and my chassis was mounted to the skate, I found this very difficult to get right. I made a couple bends slightly in the wrong place (a few inches too long/short) which I found difficult to fix (I was worried about causing a crimp in the line). After flaring and securing the line to the master cylinder I made the idiotic mistake of trimming the rear end of the line without having the line properly mounted. This resulted in my line being about 2 inches too short. I had to cut about 2 feet off the end, form a new "end" and used a union. Not ideal but it is holding up and I have no leaks. I was very annoyed at myself. If I could go back and do this a second time I would hand-form the brake line and install the fuel lines before mating the chassis to the skate. |
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Post by weekdayskier on Nov 10, 2016 22:10:27 GMT
I bought the eastwood flaring tool in anticipation. I'm not ready to use it yet, but happy to loan it out. It's in San Ramon. I'm interested in seeing how you route your lines
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Post by SeanW on Nov 11, 2016 1:14:55 GMT
This week was a lot of running around with not much done. Got my wheel and tires mounted, then decided I need ARP stud ( should have just listened to Colin .. doH! ) so that's ordered. Last night got my old studs pressed out so its ready to go, now I'm thinking of repacking the bearing with racing grease while I wait. Also am about to start on doing the brake / fuel lines, so have a few questions about that job. Are we supposed to use the same 3/16 cunifer lines for both brake / fuel ? I noticed while under the car removing the ebrake that the 3 fuel lines on my 93 seem to be bigger than the 1 brake line going toward the rear. What is the best way to do this ? Shape the lines one at a time first before cutting and flaring ?While you have your hubs apart, you may want tot think about working on the cycle fender mounts. I'm about to put my car back up on jacks to do that work. |
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Post by SeanW on Nov 11, 2016 1:17:26 GMT
Also, I have to say that going with exomotive fuel line kit saved me a ton of hassle as has mounting them to the PPF.
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Post by phocup on Nov 11, 2016 13:50:12 GMT
Thanks for the replies guys, I think I'll just run the brake line first to meet my goal of a true rolling chassis by this weekend, then worry about the fuel line sizing when Kevin gets back to me.
I MIGHT end up ordering the stainless fuel line kit but I think the brake line needs to be a hard line. Reviewing the GRM thread, Flying Miata doesn't use the stainless line due to flex in the line so I'm planning to avoid it too.
Thanks for your offer weekdayskier but I have that tool borrowed from Colin. Its great to see the community be so willing to share tools. It really does help keep cost down as these one time use tool are pretty pricey!
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Post by phocup on Nov 11, 2016 22:51:26 GMT
So the OEM brake / fuel line holder bracket is pretty cool. For the most part I think it could be reused on the Exo. There's two styles of bracket, one has a little tab that will need to be ground away to sit flush.  I was able to hand shape the OEM line to something decently straight ..  Here they are mocked up together on the OEM bracket .. not the prettiest but it will work. I'm not confident I'll be able to uncoil a line and get much better results than this anyways. You'll notice that the OEM line is kind of long. I might trim some off the engine end and redo a flare ( or just use a shorter run of rubber line ).  However, its not perfect. The OEM bracket is too wide to fit in the tunnel with the PPF at the diff end of the chassis. It would fit if I trimmed the end off a bit ( 1/3" ), but I fear that might not be enough to allow for diff movement while driving / shifting. Will need to fab up a bracket for this end. Due to the space issue and also because I want to run a brake bias valve close to the driver seat, I'll be running the brake line on the driver side of the trans tunnel held in with P clips. That will be tonight's project. Also had time to test fit the E-Brake. As others have discovered, there's some grinding involved to get the cable through that hole. Arrow pointing to the part of the cable that wont fit through the hole. Kinda sucks to grind up such a pretty precision cut round hole, but what's the point of fancy precision cutting when the hole size is too small ? Looking at you Exomotive.  |
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Post by gwnwar on Nov 11, 2016 23:14:04 GMT
Keep the brake line as far away from the exhaust system. Don't need to be heating up the brake fluid..
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Post by SeanW on Nov 11, 2016 23:15:25 GMT
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Post by phocup on Nov 11, 2016 23:20:45 GMT
Regarding getting your brake lines straight...I'm just going to leave this here... Muuuust .. noooot ... buuuuyyy .. mooore ... toooooolllls !!!  Keep the brake line as far away from the exhaust system. Don't need to be heating up the brake fluid.. Hmm .. totally forgot about the exhaust since its not installed yet .. thanks for the reminder. |
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Post by SeanW on Nov 11, 2016 23:28:04 GMT
Also...
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Post by SeanW on Nov 11, 2016 23:38:52 GMT
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Post by buildercg on Nov 14, 2016 14:54:12 GMT
I straightened my brake lines by drilling a hole in two pieces of wood, clamping the two pieces a few inches away from each other and pulling the tubing through the hole. Worked great, cost me nothing. |
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Post by phocup on Nov 16, 2016 7:46:11 GMT
Finally have enough progress to update.  First I took apart the stock fuel / brake line brackets and created a custom one from the plastic and some scrap 16GA metal plates. Its held in place solidly with 3 racing connectors and will be angled in toward the car so that the hard lines can't wiggle loose and fall out. I needed 5 of these total. Picture shows 1 down .. 4 to go.  A little black spray paint and they looks pretty good IMO when mounted ..  If you look at the far end, you'll see it solves the problem of interference with the PPF. There's actually 1/3" gap and not actually touching as it appears in the picture. Also the 16GA metal is strong enough to hold the line in place but does provide enough flex to give way if hit hard by the PPF. You can also see the kink in the line that I couldn't get out completely. It will work as is, but I know it will bug me, so I ordered a 25' spool of new 5/16 cunifer as well. Here's another shot of the lines .. going to the front this time ..  |
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Post by phocup on Nov 16, 2016 8:01:35 GMT
Also finally got seating position 100% sorted out. I have the full 5-6" of slide range on the driver side now. Bought a back brace to stop the tiny 'wiggle' of the seat being on slider, however adapter came flat and seat back was angled so out came the grinder and trusty press to fix. Will need to find a weld shop to re strengthen the part I cut.  Took quite a bit of testing, but got the ebrakes mounted in a decent spot with plenty of leftover adjustability the cable nut. However ... new problem arises. I tried to fix this by adjusting the transmission to angle down , but couldn't get much movement. It will go up a bit but that makes this problem worse. Quick google show that I'm not the only one that has this issue. So much for precision laser cut parts. :T Others have resorted to grinding away the front of that cut out a bit. I don't really want to do that so if I can't get the tranny aligned downward more tomorrow, I'll probably try a short shifter.  |
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Post by SeanW on Nov 16, 2016 14:28:42 GMT
Also finally got seating position 100% sorted out. I have the full 5-6" of slide range on the driver side now. Bought a back brace to stop the tiny 'wiggle' of the seat being on slider, however adapter came flat and seat back was angled so out came the grinder and trusty press to fix. Will need to find a weld shop to re strengthen the part I cut. Took quite a bit of testing, but got the ebrakes mounted in a decent spot with plenty of leftover adjustability the cable nut. However ... new problem arises. I tried to fix this by adjusting the transmission to angle down , but couldn't get much movement. It will go up a bit but that makes this problem worse. Quick google show that I'm not the only one that has this issue. So much for precision laser cut parts. :T Others have resorted to grinding away the front of that cut out a bit. I don't really want to do that so if I can't get the tranny aligned downward more tomorrow, I'll probably try a short shifter. I had to cut a good amount of my tunnel cover to keep the shifter from hitting. Was fine with that, tho, since the home is covered by the racequip boot.   |
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