VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1929-1932 Hydraulic Brake Kit for 31 Chevy?

Does anyone know if there are any kits available to install hydraulic brakes on a 1931 Chevrolet?

None that I am aware of. You can use brakes from '36 to mid-40s brakes. My question is why? We had a '34 pickup that lost his brakes (changed from mechanical by previous owner) on SST. If driven every day then hydraulic brakes may be better. One thing for sure if your mechanical brakes worked when you put your Chevy away they will work when you take it out. You can not say that for hydraulic brakes. Also sudden failure of mechanical brakes is almost unknown.

I agree with Chipper Dipper Doodle. If you are going to switch to hydraulic brakes, then you are going to an awful lot of work for nothing (unless you are building a street rod of course) because mechanical brakes are practically trouble free. :eek: :eek:

With mechanical brakes you get the safety of steel from pedal to wheel. It must have been some other make of car that gave mechanical brakes a bad name.

Maybe someone has an old anchor they can give me to throw out when I have to stop, cause the breaks sure don't ! Either one or two wheels jerk to a stop or they only slow the car down. I've had them apart and back together every night for the last two weeks, and they still don't work right.

Do you have modern molded linings (hard) or woven linings (much softer). The latter are much better with the mechanical brakes and steel drums.

Chip, do you have the name of a vendor that either re-lines the service bands or sells the material in a roll and rivetsfor relineing the bands on a 28 (2" x 3/16)?
I have been considering looking for some industrial material, maybe like for a crane or winch.

With the correct linings, and the brake system adjusted correctly, mechanical brakes work like a dream. More foot pressure must be applied than with hydraulic brakes though.

I know ol' Skipper will beat me up if I fail to mention the Filling Station if they do sell 'em(do they?), but I bought the original style woven pads and brass rivets from Mooney's Antique Parts in Goodrich, TX (maybe you know them, Macky...?)

It was pretty clean and straightforward job to mount them once I got the hang of it. I gave up trying to seat the brass rivets properly, so I gave up and just used steel pop rivets with matching washers. Worked just fine.

When I mounted them, I had to sand down some sticking points a wee bit where they were catching on the drum, but they've been working fine ever since. That was about two years ago with regular putt-putt around town casual driving.

Nope, I don't think that the Filling Station sells them, so you are safe for now Eddie. By the way, I drove Steve's 1932 Chevy today and it stops like a dream. He also has the mechanical brake linings on his car, and he says even at 60 MPH he has absolutely no problem in stopping the car with those linings.

The filling station sells the old style linings @ $149.50 per set - all 12.

The linings in my car are just fine. the older type. They just don't stop the car. I can push them down to the floorboard and they slow the car. If I adjust them tighter, the tires won't turn when I have the car on the lift.

I have been driving my car daily up until a couple of weeks ago when they started acting up. They never really did work great.

I don't know what your secrets are to make them work correctly, or to make them "Smoke", but mine will never do that.

Back to the anchor. The other choice is the Fred Flintstone method.............

Did you centralize your brake system??

Dog, that question sounds rather communistic!

(Sorry for the off topic post)

Grumpy, actually I think that the JYD is something other than a Communist, what I haven't decided, maybe a Canineist! I had the same problems and it was a combination of un-equalized adjustments and the cross-shafts were binding, not giving a good transfer of the torque force. The 28 uses a fixture jig to check the equalization. I finally loosened off the wheel adjustments, freed up the cross shafts with a pipe wrench and PB Blaster, adjusted each wheel and pull rod and things came together much better.
I still need the service brake bands on the rear relined, I will try Mooneys, Thanks ED...

A communist? Heck, this old mutt can barely spell the word yet let alone understand what it means. Isn't that a dude that writes a "column" in a newspaper or something? Arf, arf! Now, words like, "eat", "sleep", "drink" and "sniff" us K-9's understand!

In fact, I have had the exact "slow but won't hold" problem myself with the emergency brakes. And similarly, when I try to tighten them up, they go straight from "loose" to "bind right up". I thought about posting a query about that, but I figured I'd just bring to the local guy here to take a stab at it.

I literally tore down the entire brake system during restoration, so everything moves freely. It seemed intuitive to me that a mechanical system depends on freely moving and liberally lubricated parts to stay useful and fully functional.

Yup, I've centralized the brakes several times. I made sure they were loose and moveable.

Today, I recentralized the rears, and cleaned up the origional type soft shoes (sounds like a dance). Now they begin to slow the car down at half pedal. They fade drastically from that point down to the floorboard. I didn't check the cross members, so I'll do that tomorrow, but I am pretty sure they move.

I getting exerasperated. That's like being up the creek with a broken paddle and the flood waters are charging down on you.

When you centralize the brakes, you do all four wheels at once. Try that and see what happens.