Brakes

After I got the engine out I wanted to remove everything and paint the engine bay. When I went to loosen the brake line under the car the line broke at the fitting as soon as the wrench touched the fitting. Considering the age of the brake line it made sense to replace all brake lines and hoses. I bought Right Stuff Detailing stainless steel brake lines and fuel line from Summit Racing. I notice the original axle seals were leaking along with oil soaked brake shoes and come to a decision to replace the whole brake system. The backing plates were cleaned then beaded blaste and painted. New master cylinder, brake shoes, wheel cylinders and hardware finished replacing the old parts. The brake shoe hold-down hardware the auto parts claim to suppose to fit are for production cars after 2/3/64 64 ...not before 2/3/64. The correct hold-down hardware are the same as what is used in some 65-74 Dodge/Plymouth and AMC vehicles with 9" brakes. I found the correct axle seals to fit my axle tubes after matching them with taxicab/Sedan Delivery seals. The local auto parts store were able to get the correct axle flange to backing plate and bearing retainer to backing plate gaskets. I made my own spindle to backing plate gaskets. Although the replacement Master Cylinder cap was made of metal and not plastic it looked out of place so I bought a NOS cap from Melvin's Classic Ford. Getting the air out of the new system took some time. I thought I try gravity bleeding and it took hours to get the first drop of fluid to the rear wheel cylinder. I then used a Mityvac to get most of the air out of the lines. This is when I notice the bleed screws that came on the wheel cylinders came with metric threads and would suck air when closed. I replaced the metric bleeders with some Speed Bleeders that had SAE threads and got the job done.