So I've had my 94' SE since October and I thought I had it up to par.... New Alternator, Starter, oil changes, brake pads were good etc....

Well definitely got a wake up call this morning, when I lost brake pressure. Luckily I was only yards away from my house and my Fiancee' was following behind be so she dropped me off at work.

I'm no noob when it comes to working on cars... especially Nissans! I was a tech at Ford for 3 years and Nissan for 4. Never worked on the older ones too much... we very rarely got any in the shop.

Anyway, enough background..... I just had it towed to a local shop that my work deals with (I now manage a rental company). I have no time to fix it myself, so I figured i'd have them put a new piece of line in to replace the rusted line.

Ok... but now that I am doing a little more research, I am seeing threads about people having to replace all brake lines as well as the fuel lines... WTH?!?!?! Plllleeasssee tell me that they will somehow be able to replace a small piece of this broken line. Has anyone had any luck replaceing just a small part of a line? I understand that if one line went, the others aren't far being, but for them to replace all those lines i'm sure is going to be crazy expensive. I'd probably be better off buying the lines and doing them myself over the weekend in the shop at my work ( We have a shop with a lift at my work)

This is all just really an unexpected thing that I am still trying to comprehend... Can't even believe it was a line. My initial thought was that it was a caliper piston or a rear cylinder.... maybe even the master cylinder. Never figured it would have been a hole in a line

 

Well is it a hard line or one of the rubber brake lines? How did u come to the conclusion that it had a hole? Can u see the hole? If is a rubber line thats easy. In the end ur gonna have to replace the brake fluid anyway.

 

Its a metal line. I dropped the plastic brake line cover that hides the lines during my lunch break and found the line with a hole

 

Brakes are under high hydraulic pressure, failure of the brake line would require replacement of the entire line. You can't just simply replace a small piece. The labour required to do so would make it very easy (or easier) to do the rest of the lines going from the front to the back of the vehicle (including fuel) which most people deem to be worth it for the peace of mind.

 

If I had some extra cash lying around I would have all of the lines replaced but I recently bought a house and money is tight lol.

I know you can cut out the damaged length of the brake line and flare a new line and use connectors just as you would if you were screwing a brake line into a master cylinder

 

Just run a new line. It's easy and cheap. You can route the new line away from the rusty fuel lines to avoid disturbing them...

 

You would just be making it harder for yourself later down the road. If you gotta go in there you might as well make that one time count instead later planning a return to correct what you should've taken care of the first time. Think about it. As important as your brakes are to get you back to your loved ones at the end of the day, do you really want to have them rigged up to work or set up as they're designed to be?

 

This is true. Ill see how much they want for all the lines and charge it if I have to. Thanks for the advise!

 

Figured I would throw an update incase anyone else runs into this.

Decided to take this on myself, along with my buddy who I worked at Nissan with a few years back. He was a higher ranked tech than I was so he had a much better knowledge on how to flare brake lines. We replaced the bad length of brake line the other night and it worked perfect! Bought a brake line tool with a double wall adapter to make a strong nice strong flare. Cut out the bad section and bought a new line that was about the same length as what we cut out. Threw some fittings on everything, flared the lines and went to business tightening all the fittings. After a few trial and error attempts at getting the lines tight enough, we finally got it to the point where there were no leaks. Bled the brakes and took it for a test drive. Still no leak!!! Put it back on the lift, bled all the brake lines one more time to make sure the whole system had fresh fluid and now she is back on the road! Most expensive part of this whole ordeal was the 12 mile tow, which was $90. Next was the Flaring tool kit ... $35. Brake line and fittings were only $10 and the brake line cutting tool I bought was $7. Glad I decided to do it all myself. Also inspected all of the brake line and this small section seemed the be the only spot with rust. It looked to be caused by a plastic bracket that the lines ran through. Moisture must have been getting caught in there and rusted the lines from the outside! Needless to say, I left that bracket off and the lines are still tight in place

 

did you buy the cross drilled lines instead of cross drilled rotors now?

 

I'm going to bump this thread since I don't want to start a new one.

I believe I have a brake fluid leak as I have had to top it off every week and a half. Is the root cause a ruptured brake line? If so, how do I access and replace them? I'm guessing pop off the wheel and it'll be connected to the caliper? I do not have a brake bleeding kit, just a bunch of hand tools, so I do not know what would have to be done

 

Use the method with a bottle of break fluid and a hose hooked to the bleeder valve to get rid of excess air. Of course your gonna need a buddy.

 

So even without checking yet, since I dont have the car with me, you think it's a leaking brake line?

 

Thats what I did with my father inlaws truck, 03 1500, no problems at all. Went to napa, bought flaring tool kit and some brake line. He had a hole in his brake line as well. Flaring kit is kind of expensive though.

 

Well get the car back. Jack it up and follow from master cyl to each wheel. Or check each caliper. You'll find out where its going.