Front brake hose ID

[Jake0147]

First, my quick saab story....

Out of work early, I'm all set to go for a drive to nowhere. I've got about a hundred and twenty mile loop planned out. I seldom get to do stuff like this... I took the top off and everything before I did my pre trip, and the ONLY reason I looked underneath was just the principal of the matter, I knew the brakes were fine... Well, turns out not so much so. Left forward rear flunked the visual check for being damp, when it hadn't been before. Brief investigation reveals it's brake fluid.

Dang.

Of course that repair is a good excuse to get done with procrastinating on a little investigative PM to see just how worn and rusty the wheel cylinders are inside... I'm gonna wing it and order (hopefully) all the parts I'll need online, six wheel cylinder kits, five brake hoses, two complete wheel cylinders and enough shoes to replace one axle's worth of them. This way I have enough parts ON HAND that I do not need to take shortcuts.

Anyway, here's where I'm stumped-
At somewhere in the life of the M44 series there was an upgrade to the front brake hoses. The search got me what I need to know to know that my truck is not historical enough to warrant originality here at the cost of reliability. I want the 5 ton hose "upgrade" for sure. I have not been able to determine two things- First, how do I tell the difference between the original deuce hoses and the updated 5 ton hoses? If I have the new ones, I'm probably all set as just a new hose will put my mind at ease, but if I have the old ones, what brackets, clips, clamps, or other other miscellaneous doodad's are required for the switch?

Photo of the guilty party at the left forward rear brake, and the front left brake hose, from behind the axle looking forward. If anybody has a photo, I'd be curious to see what the difference is between the two brake hoses.

 

[cattlerepairman]

The brake hoses you have are already the "upgraded" ones. It pertains to their length; the original design called for a short hose (about half the length of the ones you have) and it turned out to be a flawed design.

When you have brake hoses that loop nice and wide, like yours, and are held by that little retainer bracket with spring, then they are the correct ones.

 

[DieselBob]

Just for information here are images of the old hose and mounting and the new hose.

 

[FireFighterHill]

My recommendation is to take the line off find a place in your area or nearest city that specializes in hydraulic lines take it to them and have them replicate it but with stainless steel braided hose. Also replace the spring and clip, both can be found at any good hardware store like ACE. I just did this on a deuce it was well worth the effort and the price wasn't much more then buying NOS parts.

Also a tip on the clip, both on the deuce i did were Philips head and corroded which led to them stripping when trying to loosen. I replaced them with stainless steel clip, spring and hardware, instead of getting a bolt with Philips I went with hex key with is alot harder to strip.

And oh just FYI this can all be done without removing the tire.

 

[Jake0147]

No stainless here... Burst strength is not an issue in this system, chaffe resistance is better than "regular" brake hose these days, but nowhere near so much as it was in times gone by. It's not a "bad" bend at all, but the line does bend a good deal with steering, and stainless does fatigue a lot faster than the fibers they're using these days, guaranteeing a shorter lifespan. Then, there is absolutely no way to inspect the braided hose. Then what? PM them every year? Two years? IMHO stainless line has a purpose, but I'm not ready to upgrade one safety factor at the expense of several others, when the one factor was not an issue in the first place.