Returning back from a three hour drive deer hunting up north,and about five miles from the house, I was trying to stop at a major intersection when the light was turning from yellow to red, pressing the brakes pedal hard, the truck was not stopping, so i laid on the brakes with all i had and the pedal went to the floor, I ran thru the intersection luckly without hitting anyone.

Drove the rest of the way home in first gear with the flasher on and on the shoulder.

Once I got home and in my driveway, I found the hard brake line from the front to back that is tucked up in the frame rail beside the fuel tank had rusted thru and caused it to blow.

After doing some checking, I have been told that FORD used a uncoated section of brake line from about the middle to the back of are trucks.

I replaced mine with Stainless steel line.


This is just a friendly heads up to check the condition of your hard brake line to pervent a accident.

 

glad you did not hit someone.
on the 02 that i sold it had 200lbs of dirt in the frame and the lines only have a small amount of rust on them, i guess the salt kills them fast.

 

Had the same thing happen to me a few years back.

 

Hello Mark,

Thanks for the heads-up. Glad you got lucky at that intersection. Take care.

 

I had exact same thing happened to me. I slammed on brake and pedal went to floor. I did fix with new coated line and have been checking for a rub.

 

Hello Robin and thank you.

Scary feeling ain't it.

What year is your truck ?

Mine is a early 99.

 

Glad to see you made it through the intersection safely Mark.

I had that line blow on me too, fortunately it was in the garage while bleeding out the front brakes and not driving on the road.

 

Same thing happened to me. But with a loaded 4 horse trailer.

 

Mark, Well I am glad you didn't hit anyone or anything. I did my hutch harpoon a couple of mths ago and I didn't like the way that line from front to back looked so I replaced it with a steel coated line from local parts house. I couldn't find SS locally. So hats off to for using a SS line. I even put all the bends back in ..OK actually I think I left a couple out but ther was still about 12 bends in the line. It sits in line holders and isn't rubbing on anything.
I keep the old line so I can use it to bend up a SS line somewhere down the road. Because I really don't think the steel coated line will last but at best 10 yrs. That's where using SS it is done once and you will never have to do it again. So Reps too for using SS.
The boys down south just don't get it like us in the Snow Belt do!

 

You should still have brakes even if you blew the line to the back, The front brakes should have stopped you, I would be looking at those front calipers.

 

I had them bust by fuel tank in same place on both a 2000 f250 and 1999 e350.

 

Mine went out in the same spot towing the boat out to the coast. 1999 model that I bought in northern indiana when I lived up there.

The brakes were wooden and spongy, but it's a dual master cylinder, so I still had front brakes. Doesn't FEEL like you do, but they still work. Got the boat all the way home that way.

CRAPPY.

 

You're right, and I'm fascinated with the photos some of you share showing the rust on your trucks.

If Mark or anyone else has pics of the rusted brake lines, I'd love to see them.

 

I second on the pictures. I'll have to check mine.

Chet

 

Pics are good