Restoring original master cylinders

[devoys 997 cooper]

Hi,does anyone know if and where i can get my original brake and clutch master cylinders repaired,they have small rust holes half way down the containers,these are very early types,as shown in my photos on my restoration project, i was thinking if there was anyway the top part of the old tin could be removed and put on a newer container,crazy i know but i would like to keep the original look,regards mark

[steady eddie]

Hi,does anyone know if and where i can get my original brake and clutch master cylinders repaired,they have small rust holes half way down the containers,these are very early types,as shown in my photos on my restoration project, i was thinking if there was anyway the top part of the old tin could be removed and put on a newer container,crazy i know but i would like to keep the original look,regards mark

Nice idea but must be impractical, just get a new one, either a nos item which are around or just quite simply a repro replacement.

Regards

steady eddy

[Tim]

Changing reservoirs over is dead easy.

Due to my lack of budget I came to an agreement with my brake reconditioner. I removed the reservoirs and sent him the cylinders. He resleeved them in stainless steel, then I replaced the reservoirs. One of the reservoirs was very pitted, but I had a later one with a good reservoir, but damaged cylinder, so I just swapped it over. Soldering the reservoir back on was pretty easy using soldering paste. There are some pictures and details on my blog.

http://minitraveller.blogspot.com.au/20 ... lives.html

They came out pretty bright after being tinned with solder, but have toned down quite a bit since.

Tim

[andy1071]

Tim is right.
The original reservoirs were soldered in place anyway.
The only 'problem' is getting the correct phosphate coating after....

[devoys 997 cooper]

fantastic !!! thankyou for the helpful info,i had a look at your blog tim the cylinders look a lovely job hopefully i can get close to that.best regards mark

[mab01uk]

I have seen some cylindrical metal sleeves turned up on a lathe with the large Hex nut added on top which then fit closely over the tapered tops on the later Lockheed tin can master cylinders, to give that early look.........they looked very authentic but not sure now who made them?

[Tim]

Bill Bell had some tapered ones modified so that the big nuts would thread on the end like the 1959 ones. I'm not sure you could do it for the intermediate aged ones with the smaller hexagon end.

Tim

[devoys 997 cooper]

not 100% sure how the sleeve is suppose to be removed from the cylinder ,i heated it up with a gas burner torch but the sleeve did not break free until i started tapping it with a mallet,distorting the cylinder in the process,this is fine as i will be discarding the old rusty cylinders,but how am i to insert the sleeves into replacement cylinders without the same problem? not really sure if i am doing it correctly?.

[Tim]

Sorry, I don't quite understand your terminology. There's the reservoir, the bean can around the cylinder, which is the big tube up the middle. To get them apart you need to heat the cylinder until the solder melts, the reservoir is only thin tin-plate so will get hot much quicker than the cylinder. Once the solder in the joint between the cylinder and reservoir softens, wearing leather gloves use an old towel or something cotton to grasp the reservoir and rotate it to prove that the solder is molten. Once it starts moving, turn it back and forwards to work it off the cylinder. The holes in the reservoir are a fairly tight fit in the cylinder but will slide off.

To get the replacement reservoir on, I first cleaned the hole up so that there were no solder blobs in there, then slipped it on to the cylinder which was already pre-tinned with solder paste and heated enough for the solder to melt. Then I brushed a bit of solder paste into the joints and warmed the cylinder and reservoir until it melted. I had to solder the necks for the caps back on too, but do that last.

Tim

[NZmember]

Try this oufit.

http://www.powertrackbrakes.co.uk/

[814CWE]

dave boswell used to sell repro early type master cyls
ive had my set a good 6 yrs and still look perfect