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So my car has sat idle for 3 months and when my son started it up today all was fine until he put his foot on the brakes and the pedal went to the floor leaving the puddle under the rear p/side wheel. all hoses etc new last year - the question is am I leaving the car too long between routine driving trips?

Hi All, so I'm at the last hurdle of the restoration before going for a "WOF"(warrant of fitness) New Zealand's version of a MOT, ive bleed the entire system 4 times now, in 2 different methods ( article from the faq and haynes manual), i have a RHD 73' tii with a dual circuit system with 2 remote servos. after the last round of bleeding, starting at the servos then rears then fronts, my brake pedal still hits the floor. i have a completely refurbished system (new lines,hoses, re sleeved cylinders, servos and calipers), Can anyone help either diagnose the fault in the system based on symptoms or give me a more specific RHD bleeding sequence to try? thanks in advance! EDIT; also just looked through the factory manual and notice i might have the front calipers upside down..... would this cause any issue with the upper, inner, outer sequence?

Hi, who sells the brake reservoir blue hose ? did some search couldnt find thanks.

In an effort to get a little more balanced braking, but still fit the stock steelies, I ordered the IE 250mm (320i) rear drum upgrade. I have benefitted from a couple writeups, but came across an issue, and need some quick help. I am putting things bact together, and preparing to put the “b$## of a spring” on the new linings/backing plates, but the new backing plate doesn’t have the same lip to hold the spring that you find on the 2002 version (pictured). ? - Do I use it anyway (though it seems it would need the lip to keep from springing everything off), or need a different spring? TIA

I've finally started making some progress. I've managed to rebuild the front struts with new tubes. The ones that came with the car were mangled. As in one strut insert crammed into an older one. Any way, new bearings 320i vented rotors and 320i calipers. I also threw a fresh lick of paint on everything. A fun discovery, one strut doesn't match the others. Other fun discovery the car had 3 lowering springs and one normal. I was under the assumption it was the mangled strut sticking that was causing the wonky ride height. I have added a little bit of plate to the front frame rail to match the overall thickness of the 2x4 sub-frame connectors. I also added in to 1.50" tubes to tie the front sub-frame mounts to the firewall. Finally after much scrubbing the engine bay was cleaned primed and painted. The goal as of now is to get on the road. A true nice paint job will happen in a few years after I've actually driven and sorted the car. As of now the engine bay is getting Massey Ferguson implement paint and the rest of the car will be getting matte black implement paint. I painted one of the quarters as a test. I think it turned out pretty good for a quick and dirty get me driving paint job.

Looking for a driver's side rear drum backing plate for a '73 2002.

This is a bunch of malarkey! So….I grabbed a Stage 1 Kit from Ireland Engineering to kick my suspension refurbish off. Easy day, right? I’m a bit of a safety hound hence the 3 ton jack stands and stacked tires under the 1600. I get frequent visits from my 3 & 5 year old daughters. They always want to see what daddy is doing with his “race car”. Basically, I just started with ripping everything off after it was on the stands. Believe it or not, the part that took me a considerable amount of time was the old brake shoes. Those darn springs were giving me fits! Must go discs out back! One of my adjustment "nut" thingy's was pretty much stripped. Pseudo success! I had originally planned to go onto the military installation to sand blast as much as I could but I was horribly informed that they no longer support a sand blasting station. Dang it! Malarkey, I tell ya'! Sooo.... One idea was to break out the pressure washer and put unsuspecting friends to work in the back yard! ^The pressure washer worked amazingly well in the hands of BMW hoarder, Brooklyn Taylor! (This coming from the guy who was nice and dry....while, eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich...) Brooklyn owns one of the only 6 speed manual equipped 850i's that I've seen in real life. V12 baby! VROOOOM. So I was left with a bunch of rusty parts with no sand blaster. Time to break out the grinder: I figured since he had so much horsepower, why not put a grinder in his hand while I got to work on something else! Probably should have covered the 70 Mustang.... Yes, it was covered in dust. More malarkey. Look what showed up! It came with a grinding wheel, but a quick trip to Lowe's rectified that with a 8" wire wheel. Priceless! After the wire wheel on the calipers, I started noticing weird things....like *different calipers* and *different brake pads*... *scratches head, moves on* Malarkey.... Rear drums were painted with engine paint. So were the calipers. Don't know how long that will hold up to the heat, but at least the brake fluid won't strip the paint! Onto the rear sub frame! FIRE!!! There's nothing like the smell of burnt rubber! More bushings.... A couple of relief cuts to release pressure so that I could use a hammer and chisel to knock these out. Paint! I did not use POR 15, rather, a good ole' can of Rustoleum. This is *not* huge resto. I just want to get the car well sorted for daily use. Rattle can will do just fine. Now let's put this thing together! Okay. In putting this thing together, I noticed that the bushings were different sizes on the ends. Basically, the thicker bushings go on the outside of the arms. So, I had to learn the hard way that these urethane bushings go in a "specific way". They are different sizes as you can see in the picture. Thick goes on the outside. Don't forget to grease these things as well! Another road block: I had to cut this little gusset down so that my bushings would actually fit. No problem! I was just shocked when I saw it. Here another thing. When I got these nice little sub-frame bushing stiffeners, they wouldn't slide through. If this happens, just take your wife's best steak knife and cut through the little membrane-like rubber mold to allow them to fit through. More paint... Half Shafts are "sooo" like late 60's early 70's... Due to this, I had to do basic maintenance. I like to keep this little bottle around...it's just easier to use for small jobs like this. No, this is not actually Craftsman oil going into my half shafts...These will be replaced with CV shafts... Grice? Where are you? Had to bend a few lines: Before: After: Somehow I can never make mine as pretty as the old lines. Wonder how long this is going to look like this! LOL Moving over to the front! Same basic stuff, bushings, but no shocks. Didn't feel I needed to spend another $200 for billys'. Not a lot of pictures... First off, I would not try to put the LCA on without an impact. :-) That bolt on the ball joint just spins and spins. Don't forget to pack it with a bunch of goo... Another issue I had when I put it back on was the new grade 5 bolts I had was rubbing the LCA. Couldn't have that so I went back to the old bolt in the inside location and just safety wired it. When the suspension compresses, there were no more issues. Much better! Actually, there were issues. Soooo, I screwed up. I painted the old shock tube with the shock in it. I taped everything up pretty well and it look really good when i finished. Problem is, I left a piece of tape on the shock cylinder.... You guessed it, the tape went into the shock body when I unintentionally compressed it and dorked up the seal. Replacement... *sigh* Things were just touch and go with getting this thing back together at this point.... Guess I over did it a little on the tranny fluid. (I never feel comfortable using the word "tranny"). Just saying. Next issue: Completely forgot to attach my springs with safety wire. Please do this "BEFORE" you put your stuff back together with shorter springs... DANGIT! Okay. Sometimes you just have to stop for the day, pop some popcorn and watch an episode of Game of Thrones. Another helpful tid bit: Tape to locate the spring while you are lowering it down. Oh one, more thing. My top spring perches were so worn that I had to add spacers at the top to keep the perch from rubbing. If I ever upgrade to coilovers, I won't have this problem. Maybe in the future. It's only money, right? I'll stop this here. I'm sure I'm missing some things. Please let me know if you have any questions? Cheers, Tim

18 months is up... Info on kit here. http://www.massivebrakes.com/brake-systems.php?p=2002_front_300

I'm working to refresh my front brakes, and I know the PO has done some upgrade to the car like a 5spd, Tii brake booster. I tore into the brakes and I want to make sure I buy the right parts, can you help identify what calipers & rotors these may be? The hubs are 4 stud, and the rotors are vented, the calipers are 2 piston, here are some pics https://photos.app.goo.gl/hA47ZndzjO7cotIw2

Well now I've done it. I was celebrating the success of installing the new rear brakes and finally got to adjusting the E Brake as my last step. One side would tighten but the other side wouldn't. Zero movement of the cable inside the driver's side brake. As is my want I thought maybe if I got the E Brake handle off I could squirt some PB in the sleeves to help free up the cable that's frozen, of course without checking FAQ and discovering what a pain it is to get the E Brake handle back on. Big mistake. But I've searched and seem to have found the thread to do this and will tackle that tomorrow. Not looking forward to that. Why do I do these things? : ( Anyway, before I do, is there a way to try to get that cable free or should I just live with one side working? Any tips will be appreciated. Thanks Nick

Hey guys! I'm wanting to upgrade both my front brakes and rear breaks to my 1973 bmw 2002. I currently have 15in BBS rims on the car. Thinking about having disc brakes for front and back. I know IE has several kits, any alternatives? Also, can i take brakes from a different bmw model and put i on the 2002?

Happy Friday everyone, Got a quick question on brake bleeding. I've replaced both front calipers, and wondering if I just need to bleed the fronts only, or should I bleed all 4? FYI, I've bled all 4 a few weeks ago after I replaced the master cylinder..... I didn't check the reservoir after the caliper replacements yet, but if it's relatively full, and no air escaped into any hoses (if level is above outlets), can I get away w/ bleeding the fronts only? Thanks in advance. I'm taking a break and going to a bar for some BBQ and a beer, and coming back to finish the work. (Side plug...If you are in the Boston area and like BBQ, you MUST go the the Village Smokehouse in Brookline, MA...Can take the trolley; Green "D" line)..... - Chris

Rock Auto has a new 2 piston caliper (left front, 48mm pistons) on closeout for $22.79. Someone needs this! http://www.rockauto.com/RSS/vehiclefeeds.php?carcode=1010697&m=wc&l=en&html=true Other closeout stuff there too...like brake pads and brake hoses... No $22 4 piston calipers, unfortunately! cheers mike

Hello, I thought I would post about my brake set up to possibly help anybody thinking about doing the upgrade(s). My 1600 is a 1968, it came with the 5 line master cylinder and 320i rear drums. The brake system was in poor conditon when I got the car (disc below minimum, stuck left caliper, and zero brake pad life). I installed the front calipers from a Volvo along with the 320i hubs and 1977 320i vented rotors. When I had everything installed I noticed the pads were sitting outside the diameter of the rotor. So I removed the caliper and milled the bolt holes into a slots. The caliper/pads now encompass the disc completely. The car stopped much better, but the pedal nearly went to the floor. So I opted to upgrade the master cylinder, I decided to go with a 1978 E12 530i master cylinder, 23.8mm bore I believe. When installing the master cylinder, I realized the E12 MC did not have the provisions to accept the residual pressure valve. The reason being, the E12 was equipped with rear disc brakes. The residual pressure valve keeps about 10 psi in the rear brakes to keep the drums preloaded (so when you hit the brakes, you dont have to pump them to get the shoes to contact the drum friction liner). So I ran to my local junk yard, there was a 320i there, but it had the 3 line master cylinder. I was poking around different cars when I found an MK1 VW Rabbit. I noticed the rabbit had two large valves/cylinders on the master cylinder (one per line for the rear brakes). So I pulled them off. I did some googling and the reserach showed they were residual pressure/proportioning valves. So I installed the valve between the master and rear brakes. I bleed the system. I was a little nervous as I wasn't sure this would work. But so far the car stops very well. I didn't get a chance to watch someone hit the brakes hard to see if the car nose dives (rear brakes not working), but since the VW Rabbits are front heavy I think it will work/feel like it is working. The master cylinder gave the pedal an excellent stiff feeling (like my E86 M Coupe). I still need to adjust and lube the rear drums, but I suspect everything will work out well and braking will improve even more. I will post an update this week.

Where might I find rear hoses long enough for the vw caliper/rotor conversion? stock mk3 hoses are too short

I bought some rebuilt calipers and they came in seemingly without any cad plating. I have an acquaintance who offered to powdercoat them for me (I'm thinking gold or silver). Is it a bad idea...will the seals be damaged by the oven heat? Thanks in advance for all the shared wisdom.

In the caliper rebuilding article does felix have tii calipers cause it seems that he is using the tii rebuild kit. Now im just asking cause the tii one are a bit cheaper but would it be fine using them. Here is the link to the article: http://www.bmw2002faq.com/content/view/91/33/ This is to the tii rebuild kit: http://www.rogerstii.com/servlet/the-738/BMW-2002tii-Bavaria-Brake/Detail This is to the 2002 rebuild kit: http://www.rogerstii.com/servlet/the-737/BMW-1602-2002-Brake/Detail

Does anyone know what brake calipers these are? They just came off my 73 02. https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/3f_nhOmaNrDcpEIlVlCBnGbG6VnmqB99VMA8ODWgkZg?feat=directlink https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/NfkGV2MMz9TfYruVeFmAdWbG6VnmqB99VMA8ODWgkZg?feat=directlink https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/v2WIkvxiiyFEFMGpP24Lf2bG6VnmqB99VMA8ODWgkZg?feat=directlink

Just wondering if anyone has a lead. Quality is paramount but as usual price is a considerations as well. Best- Pete

STORY So I was heading back from my job, and as I pull off, everything feels fine. I take a relatively "steep" downwards hill for a little while. There was a red light so I stopped, and to my surprise I had to pump brakes 2 times for it to completely stop. Everything is fine for like 10 seconds and out of no where the pedal starts pushing further. I was losing brakes. I pulled on the handbrake otherwise I would have ended up on the car in front of me. I got home safe. Looked everywhere around the car, no leaks. TL;DR Pedal sunk to the floor while stopped on downwards hill. Feels like there may be air in the system OR brake booster issues? No leaks, no suspect sounds, nothing. Car not currently safe to drive, and really wish I can solve this fast. Thanks! P.S. If it gets to the point of buying a break booster, do you have any aftermarket parts suggestions that are not too expensive? Thanks again!