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I'd like to know if anyone else has experienced the issues I'm coming across.
I have a 1972 Saab 99. It's basically original but always had a B engine/single carb in it (thank God). A number of years ago (in the 90's) the early type 4 speed transmission exploded quite spectacularly, and the only thing I had to drop in it was a 76 engine and transmission.. I moved the carb and inlet over from the old engine.
Soon after I realized that the 76 transmission was wider than the older one, so I had to convert to 76 axles and Girling brakes on the front. To which I realized that the older brake lines were SAE and the newer ones metric. I basically had to hand fabricate the small pipe that goes from the flex line to the caliper. That was fine for a number of years and eventually the car was retired for a while.
Now I have decided to drive it again and I'm finding that basically all the flex lines are no good with a few being so bad you can't even blow compressed air through them. But finding early 99 flex brake hoses seems to be next to impossible. Websites have the later ones, but never the early ones. They're SAE male on both ends. Plus I'm at a point where I just want to get new rear calipers anyway, and I'd rather just switch ALL the flex lines over to metric and have the switchover for the back to just be under the back seat.
But here's the BIG problem. Not only can I not find SAE flex lines, I can't get hard SAE lines of the right style. Where the SAE lines for the back brakes screw in, the hydrulic fitting is a bubble flare, which is like all the metric ones for later Saab and pretty much everything else. When you buy male SAE lines, it has a simple single flare which won't seat correctly. And though I have been getting daring in making my own brake lines from bits of other brake lines, I can only do a simple flare fitting that goes under a female connector. The bubble flare is not a simple end to make.
So the issue is this. Even if I get the proper early 99 rear brakes (ATE), I won't be able to get the SAE lines anywhere. And correct me if I'm wrong, is the later 99 rear caliper made by ATE (I recall that '75 is a weird year as they had Girlings on the BACK too, then switched back to ATE)- interchangable with the early ones?
Now I don't know if having later Girlings on the front and old ATEs on the back means the brakes will be stronger on the front- right now that's the least of my issues. If I burn through front brake pads slightly faster that's something I can live with.
Other options that aren't really good for me-
replacing the whole brake system up to the Master cylider. Well, there's apparently nothing wrong with my MC, and I'm under the impression that converting the older MC/brake pedal assembly to a later one is a bit of a botch job.
Going back to an older transmssion and older axles and staying true to '72. Well, if youre like me and you have a 99 with a working transmission period, you don't want to give that up. Besides I've not ever seen an early 99 gearbox anywhere.
Any thoughts? I know some of you out there have had these issues.
I'm not super picky about this car being original. I also have a '73 4 door which actually is all original in thos areas, but needs rust repair, and I'm not ready to pilfer it for parts, quite yet.
-Tara
posted by 24.34.23...
, Sun, 25 Aug 2013 06:22:08
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