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The old brake booster on my ’78 Olds Delta 88 failed last week, so I ordered a new (reman) one from rockauto and put it on today:
Can’t finish at the moment. New booster is in the firewall, but the hex nuts refuse to tighten past the ends – they become too hard to tighten any further. All four of them do this. They’re the same hex nuts I removed off the old booster, had no trouble removing them. I spent the two hours straight trying to tighten them further – no dice. They’ll loosen easily though. Suggestions? Do I need some sort of grease, or new hex nuts? What am I doing wrong…? (and yes I made sure I wasn’t cross-threading them)
Plus the push rod won’t fully seat with the brake pedal:
Brake booster work is so frustrating. I really want to drive her again but can’t do squat without brakes.
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I assume these nuts ( yellow arrows ) came with the replacement unit.
My suggestion would be use the hardware that was supplied with the unit.
From the looks of it there appears to be excessive build up on the brake pedal stud.
Might try some emery paper and clean it up the apply some grease.
If that fails, and the connecting rod eye bolt is under sized, might try to file it open until it fits properly.
Considering the age of the vehicle, replacement parts may not fit as well as the originals.[quote=”nightflyr” post=189728]I assume these nuts ( yellow arrows ) came with the replacement unit.
My suggestion would be use the hardware that was supplied with the unit.
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Those two nuts are for the master cylinder. It didn’t come with four nuts for cowl-side, so I’ve had to use the old ones off the old brake booster. The studs on that side are slightly smaller on the ends (which the hex nuts fit perfectly onto), but then they enlarge slightly after that (which is exactly where the hex nuts won’t go past). This makes me think I’ll need larger hex nuts than the original ones.From the looks of it there appears to be excessive build up on the brake pedal stud.
Might try some emery paper and clean it up the apply some grease.
If that fails, and the connecting rod eye bolt is under sized, might try to file it open until it fits properly.
Considering the age of the vehicle, replacement parts may not fit as well as the originals.I thought that build up was old grease or something, it was also on the cotter pin I removed from pedal earlier. That thing the yellow arrow is pointing to though, is actually an old washer. I’ll try your suggestion though.
Thanks for your input 🙂
If the nuts you have do not fit.
you’ll need to get a proper fitting set, DO NOT force what you have on to the studs you will damage the threads[quote=”nightflyr” post=189735]If the nuts you have do not fit.
you’ll need to get a proper fitting set, DO NOT force what you have on to the studs you will damage the threads[/quote]The hex nuts I needed were indeed metric – M10x1.50, specifically. Picked up a bag full of them and their flat washers at Home Depot. Threw those on this afternoon and they fit perfectly, got the brake booster secure. Manual says to torque them down but god help me if I can actually get a small torque wrench up in the cowl there, so I just tightened them nice & snug like I did on my old Accord a while back and that worked fine.
A few carefully-positioned blows on the pushrod with a hammer worked, it is fully seated with the brake pedal. Had some trouble getting the cotter pin back on but I figured it out (albeit unconventionally).
There was a slight scare as I had unbolted this unknown device from the steering column yesterday to access one of the bolts, and today I couldn’t get it back on at first. I’m not sure what it is, but it looks important and seems to have some function in the steering column. I did eventually get it back on correctly.
After reconnecting the vacuum lines and securing the master cylinder, I reconnected that battery and finally drove the Olds around for the first time in over a week. The new brake booster works wonderfully. No problems at all with it, my brakes are normal again. Drove around the city and stopped at a gas station to find my brake lights were stuck on (d’oh!) and that the brake pedal was a good few millimeters away from the brake light switch under the dash. Drove home and worked up a fast “ghetto” solution 😀
Yep, pennies and gorilla glue. Just enough to where the brake light switch releases normally as it did before, my brake lights work regularly again.
At the gas station (or as I joked, her “native habitat”):
Had a group of young guys come up and ask about the Olds. They seemed really into it. I don’t really like or want the attention but it’s nice to have the Olds appreciated especially by young folk (I’m 24, they seemed about my age or younger).
Thanks again! 🙂
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