Thursday 17 April 2014

BRAKE MASTER CYLINDER OVERHAUL

Evidence that your President does indeed get his hands dirty:
Master cylinder removed from 4/50 ...........
                                                   ...................... and re-fitted with new seals.

I've just completed an overhaul of my brake master cylinder using the 'Richard Spencer' method detailed on the web site discussion forum, with no real problems, so thanks Richard & everyone else for the technical advice. Richard's full article, which can be viewed via a link from one of his postings, goes into much more detail than in his original posting, but I had just a few comments on his notes as a result of my experiences:
1. I didn't bother jacking the car up, & found that I could reach the through-bolts quite easily.
2. Not sure why it may be necessary to actually remove the nut on the pedal stop bolt - I just slackened it off.
3. Unscrewing the plunger from the push rod was indeed a fiddly exercise as Richard says, but it's still quicker than the workshop manual method!
4. I held the push-rod up with a bit of wire wound around a rod across the top of the chassis rail after I'd extracted the cylinder - that held it nicely in place for re-fitting.
5. I was clearly fortunate that the push-rod & plunger lined up & screwed together first time. Separating the two parts of the push-rod is key to this method, but well worth it as far as I'm concerned.
I didn't use a new or refurbished cylinder, & just got a new set of seals for mine, which worked out OK for me. There was a lot of sludge around the piston & a bit of corrosion in non-critical places, but it all looked fine after a good clean up.

Good luck if you've got to carry out this maintenance task soon.  Don't worry - follow the advice on the Forum & it's done in a couple of hours.
Patrick Carroll

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