I've recently purchased a 1985 F-250 with a 6.9 Diesel. This truck sat for a long time and was rarely driven. Only 83,000 miles. The trouble is some of the brakes were stuck and the master cylinder was losing fluid. Long story short, I've replaced the Calipers, shoes, hoses and brake lines on the front. On the rear, it now has new wheel cylinders, springs, shoes, brake lines and new hose to the rear axle. New booster and master cylinder too.
All of the lines were replaced with NI-Cop.

Thanks to this site for guiding me through all of this; even for the purchase of the correct tools for flaring. I purchased the Cal-Van complete flare kit. It is a wonderful tool.

I've run into two problems. One is with the Ni-Cop and I didn't find it until trying to bleed the brakes. On one of my front lines, the flare that goes into the hose that connects to the caliper, broke off inside the hose fitting. The bell part of the flare is down inside the threads of the hose fitting and the Ni-Cop line came out straight with a little bubble in it about 1/8" from the end. There doesn't appear to be any way to get it out, so I guess I'm buying a new hose. Upon taking it apart, the hose has a protruding center piece that I'm guessing goes inside the flare to make the seal. This appears to be the same size as the brake line. My question is: should I use larger than 3/16 line to make this connection, or did I crank it up too tight and rip the bell end of the flare off?

The second issue is getting fluid to flow through to the rear brakes. I've tried vacuum bleeding, gravity bleeding and bleeding with the pedal. (Yes the master cylinder was bench bled - several times too.) I'm assuming the proportioning valve is the problem. It does not look like the proportioning valve posted in other discussions. It simply looks like a block with no springs or the little valve stem that you have to push or pull to reset.

I took it apart and all that's inside is a brass slug with a rubber washer around it. It slides back and forth with ease, but I can't bleed through it. My next step is to simply remove it from the system, since it only appears to be switch to indicate brake failure in one of the lines. (Pictured below).

Any ideas on either one of these questions would be helpful.

Thanks!

 

Stick with 3/16 line. If you are flaring your own lines, sometimes things happen. Don't tighten them too tight, you can put a dent in the cone on the fitting and then it will always leak.

Did you loosen the line going to the rear off the proportioning valve and see if fluid would come out when you stepped in the pedal? Is fluid coming out of the master? Loosen all the fittings to make sure where you are losing the fluid flow.

 

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...lve-issue.html


Start with post 6

 

When cutting the line, be sure to ream the end before flaring, otherwise the ID can be too small, depending on how aggressive you were with the cutter.

 

Thanks for the info.
On flaring brake lines, I probably tightened the line nut too much and broke the flare off in the connector to the rubber hose. I'll be picking up a new hose today on my way home from work.

On the proportioning valve: I checked out the thread mentioned above and that valve looks similar to mine, but mine does not have the front nut and pin to reset. Somehow, they manufactured this thing by installing all of the internals from the rear port.
When I was bleeding the system, I did have pressure out of the master cylinder, but none at the rear of the proportioning valve. I borrowed a vacuum bleeder and could get nothing. I had suction, but after 30 attempts at drawing, nothing came out. At this point, I am ready to bypass the valve.

I promise to do better on my flares!

I'll let you know what happens. Fortunately, I have other vehicles.

 

After several weeks of not looking at the truck, I finally got back to it. Everything is working now. Here's a list of issues and what I did to solve the problems:
I had a problem with the flares ripping apart on both of the front brake hoses where the Ni-Cop brake line attached to the hose on the frame. On both sides, the bell of the flare ripped completely off and was lodged in the hose. I took them back to the auto shop and it appears the the metal tube protruding from the hose (where it goes inside the bell of the flare) is a little too big. There was no luck getting the broke flare out of the brake hose. The guys at the store tried it also and had no luck even with special picks and awls. Bought two new hoses and a piece of steel line. the drivers side is steel tube from the connection on the hose to the "Tee" coming off the master cylinder. The passenger side has a 6" piece of steel tubing coming off the hose and then switches over to Ni-cop back to the "Tee". The steel lines made a world of difference on the hoses. The rest of the truck is Ni-Cop.
Another problem was getting fluid through the proportioning valve. It has been eliminated. The front brake line from the master cylinder goes to a "Tee" mounted where the proportioning valve was. I made two plates out of plastic lumber and sandwiched the new "Tee" between them and added a little epoxy resin to hold everything in place. It is a work of art. The rear brake line runs straight from the master cylinder to the load valve mounted on the axle. Form there, it's Ni-cop to the wheel cylinders.
When it came to bleeding, I had some issues there too. I had my wife push the pedal down and I would open the valve at each cylinder, but I wasn't getting the pressure. Fluid should come shooting out of the valve on the cylinders and it wasn't. I had a buddy come over and he recommended a different method. He sat in the truck and pumped and pumped and pumped with all of the cylinders closed. Finally, he got the pedal to build up some pressure. At that point, I opened a valve on the rear and the fluid came out like it should. We did the same process again. Close all valves, pump the pedal continuously until it built pressure, then opened a valve. Both of the rears required this process to be repeated three or four times. we did the same on both sides in the front. Everything is now working fine.
Looking back, I probably could have left the proportioning valve in the system, but it's working fine.
I know the proportioning valve in my other truck has no "guts". The shuttle valve was gone when I bought it and when I snapped a brake line, all brakes went out! Scares the crap out of you. Guess I'll have to do that one next!

 

At least when you loose your brakes, you will know EXACTLY where to look

 

Yeah, sounds like you were over tightening the nuts on the brake lines. I've had copper nickel to my flex lines on the front for about 3 years now without any issues.
But glad you got it sorted.