Russell Universal DOT Approved SS Brakes how-to

[Snow]

Hi all, I replaced my 20+ year old front rubber brakelines with Russell Universal Street Bike Brakelines.
There are a few tips I have, picked up along the way. The very first one is make SURE your master cylinder is in *perfect* working condition. I thought* mine was ok, but turned out I needed to rebuild it, luckily I had picked up a rebuild kit a couple months ago. The whole rebuilding of the master cylinder took me an extra hour and a half at least, so I would suggest rebuilding it in a different repair session.

Safety first: always make sure to wear proper eye protection and protective rubber gloves when working with anything relating to brakes. This is for education only and I will and cannot be held liable for anything good or bad that happens to you, your wife, your bike, your dog, or grandmother in regards to this information. In essence, don't blame me if something goes wrong.

Also, I suggest having a spray bottle full of soap and water readily accessible just incase you spill brake fluid on your bike.

Alright, onto the brakelines - the parts I actually used were:

2 38" Universal Russell lines (R58142S) 33.95 each
4 Banjos 35° flare (R4050C) 8.95 each
4 10mm crush washers (R49005 - ten pack) 3.95 pack

The prices above are from flanderscompany.com from May of 2003, prices subject to change - any local motorcycle shop should be able to get these parts for you fairly quickly, just make sure they understand you want the Universial Stainless Street Lines that are sold by the inch, it took me saying that several times for my shop to understand I didn't want a kit.

I would highly suggest instead of getting 4 35 degree banjos, get 3 35 degree flare and 1 straight banjo or even 2 35 degree flare, 1 straight, and 1 15 degree - use the 35 degree flares on the calipers and the other two on the master cylinder.

You should re-use you stock caliper banjo bolts and the dual banjo from the splitter, as long as they are

in good condition. Also, make a diagram of how your brakelines are routed, you will need to route the new ones the same way.

Remove the 10mm mounting bolt from the splitter


Remove the screws from the brakeline to fender fasteners, there is two - one for each caliper - and remove

the fasteners for later use.


Be careful to not damage the rubber parts of these fasteners


Place a draining bowl/bucket/whatever under your calipers and remove the banjo bolts from the calipers.


Place rags and anything else protective you have under the master cylinder to protect your beloved paint...


...and remove the banjo bolt securing the brakelines to the master cylinder


Also, while you are up there, remove the master cylinder filler cap and remove all the brake fluid from it

- I used a couple disposable shop towels to remove the fluid.

Attach the new banjos to the new brakelines, but do not tighten all the way (remember to tighten then after

everything is aligned and on the bike)


Next, we need to attach the brakelines to the master cylinder using our dual banjo bolt




Now, remove the lines from your bike - I used a ziptie to keep the caliper ends together to make it easier

to remove the lines - and remove the dual banjo bolt from the splitter.


I found it easiest to first remove the 2 10mm instrument cluster mounting bolts (I have a Standard, mostly)

and then attaching the dual banjo bolt and lines to the master clyinder (not much room btw).

Make sure you use 3 crush washers here - on the banjo, you should have: crush washer, banjo, crush washer,

banjo, crush washer. Note: I was able to make the banjos face the same way in the end, but this is where

you want to bajos with different amounts of flare, like straight and 15 degree or whatever.


Now, get that diagram out that I told you to make of the brakeline routes and route the new lines.Being

that my bike is "kinda special", I was able to route the lines behind the headlight quite easily.


Now, before you mount the other ends of the lines to the calipers, let them hand over a drain bucket/bowl/whatever and fill the master cylinder with fluid. Pump the brake lever (not all the way, you don't want to dislodge your plunger or anything) repeateadly until fluid is coming out of both lines - make sure to keep putting fluid in your master cylinder so it does not go empty.

Next, attach the lines to the calipers and tighten all the banjo connectors - when I did this, I forgot to tighten one of the top ones and ended up getting a "spray suprise" after bleeding.

Now, bleed your brakes, one caliper at a time - I used speedbleeders, but mityvac would be even better. Make *sure* to keep fluid in the master cylinder.

After both sides are bled, attach the brakeline to fender connectors.

Also, reattach your instrument cluster.

The job *should* be done, but I may have forgotten something - getting it right is up to you.

Pete Guhl, aka Snow

Feeling free to copy this text and pictures, as long as you do not sell the information I have provided here.

[Dragonrider]

I used these on my friend's 81 'wing. Reasonable price compared to other options, very good quality. They have held up for two years and still look and preform great.

I highly recommend these.

[tiel]

I would have to agree that the SS brake lines are a great Mod. They look great as well, I did mine a little different. Instead of buying fittings for each connection, you can save a little money by using 3 fittings and 1 "tee". I used a single feed line down to the tee then two equal length lines from the tee to the calipers. I just thought that an extra line coming down from the already cluttered handlebars was too much. I have also noticed that by eliminating the "stock" splitter and going to the tee seemed to increase the braking and even out my pad wear some.

I looked at it from the frame of mind that by having one feed down to the tee then equal length lines coming out of the tee at the same level etc. allowed the brakes to work equally.