I've been servicing my 2002 F150 getting it ready for a long vacation drive, added a little refrigerant to the AC, changed the coolant, engine oil and filter, tranfer case oil, replaced the wipers and then last dropped the trans pan, replaced the filter and refilled. When I was finishing the trans refill, I backed it off the ramps and a rusty rear steel brake line broke. I was planning to leave Monday on my trip and it takes several days to get a preformed replacement brake line. It's the one the goes from a fitting at the axle housing vent to the right rear. It has multiple bends. It appears my only option to repair it tomorrow is to bend a straight piece of tubing and double flare the ends for the new fittings. At least it busted before the trip and not during. Dang it! I shoulda bought that new RAM I was looking at.

 

Yeah, that will work. Just be sure to zip tie it is bouncing around.

 

This morning I bought a 51" steel brake line with fittings already on it from O'reillys. They also had a tube bender that I borrowed. It wasn't as bad as I thought to bend the tubing and get it to fit. It's installed and the brakes are working. Since I bent it to the approximate same as the original, it fit into the two clamps that keep it from vibrating. I bled the brakes by myself. A while back I bought a section of tygon tubing that fits the bleed valves and I drilled a hole in the top of a mayonnaise jar so that the tubing fit in snugly and ran the tube all the way to the bottom. And I drilled another vent hole in the top of the jar. With this hooked to the caliper bleed valve. the fluid that comes out covers the bottom of the tygon tubing and keeps air out. So, all I had to do was pump the brakes a few times to get the fluid to flow and the brake was bled. I had a full pedal without bleeding the other side. You have to make sure the master cylinder doesn't go dry when you do this but it works great.

 

Glad you got it fixed! I do the same bleeding trick too. I like to flush the system every few years.

My buddy had a line go out on his '03 F250 v10. He did the same thing, except he did install the fittings himself. He got high end brake hard lines and did the entire system since the others probably weren't far behind.

 

Yeah, I'm a little worried about some of the other lines. I drive out on the beach a lot and this is why I'm getting a little rust. But, tomorrow I'm headed out on a long trip and hope my F150 serves me well.

 

Fluid film is your friend 👍