Now let me say right off if you are the guy who wrote the article on
311s.org, or are in any way associated with it or any of the equipment
listed, I AM NOT MAD AT YOU, OK? I DON'T WANT MY MONEY BACK OR ANYTHING. I
KNOW YOU ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE. I understand how complicated this stuff can
be, things change, castings vary in thickness, it was the holidays, etc.,
and none of the technical problems are insurmountable at all, even for me,
but the extra non-technical problems I had, especially the delays. made
it.....well, words fail me. I did not necessarily order the parts from the
people in the article, either. Many people sell Earl's parts, and a few
people have made the manifolds, so there is no attempt here to flame anyone
- more of a story of a project that was cursed. Hope you find it either
informational or amusing or both. Humor is misery in retrospect. I hope to
get enough mileage out of retelling the story to make it worth the
suffering.
Understand this, too - I live in Florida. Anything that comes from the west
coast takes 5 days or a bunch of extra freight money - and is expensive even
when slow. SO every time I need something I am delayed days or out a bunch
of money, and my whole point is to SAVE money, plus I need my Roadster to
drive, as I need to do the front end on the Mercedes. So time is also
important (time=money, right?).
Ok - the car has been sitting for 25 years. The left front caliper is
leaking, and the bleed valves are seized, I rip one right in half trying to
bleed them, rebuilding the old caliper cylinders made me nervous - so -
spend a bunch of money on new Datsun parts, or do the Volvo thing? I look at
the prices and I opt for the Volvo conversion because I am poor, and it
looks pretty straightforward.
First off: I search the net for Volvo Calipers. Best deal I found was at
rockauto. I think it was $130 loaded with freight including the core charge
I was never going to get back. I find a local guy, $120 so I buy it there,
but they have to get the calipers and pads separately. Prepay, and go get
them - oh, they forgot the little matter of a core charge, $30. I'm down
$20. I pay, cuz I want it and they've been helpful before, and it's there
right now. Oh wait the pads aren't here, they'll be here tomorrow. Go get
them. Oh wait. No hardware kit. We can't get that. I order it off the web.
$12 with freight (could have saved a couple bucks, but I have other problems
now but since it's already been delayed a day, I can wait til they arrive
and I don't have to go to the store. I also order nicer brake pads and
backing plates, I'll take the other pads back). Now down a total of $42 +
cost of upgrade on pads and lost three days compared to ordering from
rockauto.
At the same time I order banjo bolts, blue label express. By the way these
now each come from Earls with 2 aluminum crush washers each so you don't
have to order those unless you think you might need some (and you might). I
also order the brake manifolds, which arrive pronto. The banjo bolts and
crush washers, however, do not. I wait a couple days, because, heck, it's
just 4 stinking bolts. I call - the order didn't get processed. The people
are very nice, call me at home at night, very sorry, and say they will get
them in next day and overnight them to me because it's taken so long. Well,
I end up paying and only getting 2nd day freight. Down 5 days. Waiting on
bolts. It's Christmas time too, I am doing all the Christmas crud, shipments
are screwed everywhere, everyone's on vacation, etc.
Ok the bolts arrive. I've got all my parts in a box and it's time to get the
machine work done. As soon as Christmas is over, I get the calipers and
hub/rotor off ($12 for a breaker bar, $5 for a 6-point 1/2 inch drive socket
to get them off, destroy one brake line, you will too, $5 for a generic, the
rubber lines need replacing, another $18 from NAPA, close enough, and I got
one stock Nissan in the shed) and away I go. I get new grease seals and am
ready to repack the bearings too.
Nobody will touch the rotors. At least not until after the New Year. 5 days
at least. I contact my buddy the Reverend George Scott who is also a
mechanic (plug: econofix.com-ugly site but he gets hits and business and ad
money from it. Good newbie info on cars too). He whines he doesn't want to
do it either, but if I will help move his brake lathe and other heavy-ass
equipment 40 minutes away from his old shop to his new one, he will do the
rotors and drill out the calipers for free. Cool! I am working but I am
saving money! Call it back to even cash-wise after I buy us a six-pack when
done. We do the rotors, but we're not sure if we maybe we should take a
little more off don't want to take off too much. No sweat, we'll fit it up
later and if we need more we'll take a little off tomorrow. Time to drill
out the calipers. Unpack the drill press - aaaaannnnddd the 1/2 inch bit is
broken clean in half. AAArrrggghhhhh. Ok back to town, we both have things
to do and can't work on it any more. The next day I get a half inch bit and
take it to George because he's busy moving his shop - but I get the wrong
location, I think he's at the new place, but he's at the old shop, extra 1/2
hour of driving and I am running late meeting my brother to start with. The
delay means he can't get to it til tomorrow. I meet my brother and the rest
of the night is a bit foggy, but when I wake up I have no bruises or tattoos
so no sweat. Another two days behind though.
The next day I have already promised to help George move some stuff (he
helped me pick up the car in Jax with his truck so I owed him) and I pick up
the calipers. We go home, and mock up the calipers and the rotor turns and
we are golden -except you really need 1-1/2 inch long bolts. It's Friday. No
Grade 8 bolts til Monday. Can't even order them - it's New Year's Eve. No
bolts til Tuesday. AAArrrgghhhhh. Another weekend with it sitting. OK, we'll
mount the manifolds to the calipers - hey where are my $40 late banjo bolts?
Nowhere to be found. I search the shed. The other roadster. The Toyota. The
Mercedes. I take all my drawers in my room and my shop and dump them in a
pile and search it while screaming obscenities. I do not light the whole
pile on fire and dance around like a loon, although the temptation is
powerful. No bolts. I call around - everyone has to order them in and it's
going to take the aforementioned week or ton in shipping to get them.
Reverend George prays for my soul. I go get tequila.
I end up at a friend's house, (no I'm not driving although I am drunk), I am
telling the story, he mentions a local speed shop who can order the Earl's
stuff for me. I hit them Monday, the stuff arrives the next day. It's
expensive as heck, but I have it in my hands. $40 and two days (+ a weekend)
behind. I also score the 1-1/2 inch bolts I need while I wait and I do the
bearings and seals and bolt the hub/rotors on.
Ok, let's bolt that sucker together. Uh oh, inch-long banjo bolts are too
long. Here, grinder grinder grinder, good boy, now the bolts fit. Uh oh, the
threads on the rubber lines are too long too. More grinding. Ok that all
looks good, let's bolt it up - when it becomes apparent to me that I
probably had the calipers on upside down, or somehow oriented wrong when
mocking up because the rotors are grinding on the caliper. I consider
getting someone to spin the rotor while I grind on it with an angle grinder,
but that seems a bit wrong somehow. I figure at this point I can probably
just grind a tiny bit out of the caliper, and I won't have to disassemble
the now-freshly-regreased rotor/hub assembly, and re-grease it and put new
seals in again. Nuts, my grinder isn't big enough. I go to a friend's and
borrow his bigger grinder, and I grind what looks like the right amount off.
Hard to tell, because it's all curved in there (Note - just grind the rotors
down, if you try to grind out of the caliper only, you might not be able to
get the brake hardware pieces across the rotor, it looks really tight on
mine). I go home and pass out.
I get home from work the next day and go to put it together. Uh-oh, not
enough ground off. I get out the Dremel and spend a painful 2 hours
grinding, putting the calipers on, taking them off, grinding, taking them
off putting them on......I am tired and the wife is getting mad.......I have
put the caliper on at least 10 times
Next day I do the same to the other side......both sides have the rotors not
centered or even near it. It takes two washers per bolt on the right side to
get it right but it's dead-center, and I use 1 washer and a shim (had been
on the right caliper originally) per bolt on the left side and it's close
enough. I am still tired and my wife is madder. I drink tequila alone after
she goes to bed and feel bad the next morning,
Next night: I am going to put on the pads and bend up the brake line and try
to get it bled. I am a bit confused by the brake hardware, having never done
it- last time I bought calipers they were loaded (remember back at the
beginning when I couldn't get loaded calipers?) But I get it figured out,
and start putting it together. One of the retaining clips slips loose and
goes SPROING through the dark - 20 feet away I hear it bounce off my fence
into my leaf-covered yard. I rake the area and search through the pile of
leaves. I am gritting my teeth so hard my jaws hurt. I consider hitting
myself in the head with the hammer but give up on that idea as
counterproductive. I drag a magnet around the yard. I am giving up when I
find it and I do give up anyway and have more tequila. I have now lost a
hairpin retaining clip too, but I figure that can be got at the hardware
store. That proves not to be the case, but I get something close enough
after 4 stores the next day.
All I should have to do is go home, put the pads in, bend up the new brake
line and bleed it and I'm good. I go home and I have to take off the
passenger side pads where I had test-fitted them the night before.
SPROING!!!! Another clip flies out into a fresh section of leaf-covered
lawn. I repeat the curses and other procedures from the previous night and
eventually find the clip and put the pads in, start pumping.
It's leaking at the manifold on the driver's side. I take it all apart again
and take out the banjo bolts figuring that they are bottoming out and
preventing the crush washers from being crushed. I grind 'em down some and
re-assemble. I'm concerned I might not be torquing the banjos down enough
because I only have 6-point sockets and I can't fit one on the banjo bolts,
it's too thick for the clearance between the bolt heads and the manifold. I
need a thinner 12-point socket, I guess, or else I have to modify the
manifold with the trusty Dremel. I tightened it up pretty tight though with
a box-end wrench without stripping the heads, re-assemble. Still leaking.
Maybe the crush washers didn't like re-tightening? And that is where I am
today. Friday. If I can't find new crush washers locally it will be ANOTHER
weekend of it sitting up in the air, going nowhere..
So from a technical standpoint my modifications to the write-up on 311s.org
are very minor:
1) Either buy shorter (not sure how much) banjo bolts or be prepared to
grind them down so they don't bottom out. Have a thin wall socket on hand to
tighten the bolts, or else you might need to grind out a little clearance in
the manifold to get a thick-wall socket or wrench in. Clean out the hole too
when done grinding.
2) Be prepared to grind the threads on the rubber hoses to fit, or have your
manifold made with that connection deeper. I used Nissan original on one and
NAPA swap on the other, they both needed grinding.
3) You need 1-1/2 inch long bolts to hold the calipers on; the article has
1-1/4 listed in the parts write-up, and 1-3/8 in the body of the text. You
may also want to get some shims and extra washers to get the calipers
roughly centered on the rotors (it doesn't need to be exact), I certainly
needed them. You might even need 1-3/4 long bolts if you use enough shims,
just be sure they aren't impacting the rotors on the back side.
4) I don't see how you could mount the brake hardware without grinding down
the rotors, so I don't think you can do this project by grinding out
clearance in the calipers. The write-up says a little under 11-1/4 inch
diameter for the rotor, but it's really more like a little less than 11-1/8
( the 11.1125 appears correct).
5) The banjo bolts come with 2 crush washers each, so you don't necessarily
need extras, but if you have to tighten and remove them a few times they
harden and won't seal so you might want some extras. I prefer copper to
aluminum myself.
6) You don't have to take the rotors off the hubs if you are getting the
edges done on a brake lathe. At a regular machine shop you might have to.
Check with your shop first.
7) Replace the rubber brake lines, and be ready for at least one steel line
to be destroyed while you're at it. Might consider getting the two front
steel lines from a vendor ahead of time or be ready with some generic or
flex braided steel lines (I like the braided but I am poor so not yet)
And that's it.
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