Braided stainless steel brake lines a waste of money?

[nick7269]

I bought new brakes lines for a 93 K1500 thinking I was buying a better quality brake line.

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I have the front end up on jack stands and noticed the old brake lines have dry rotted rubber splitting open. Under the rubber I can see braided lines! All this time I have been thinking that factory lines were just layers of rubber/ plastic! Now, I am thinking that I might be a fool for falling for sales gimics at this piont. I can buy each brake line (AC delco gold) for about $12 and about $15 shipping, for a total of approx $51. So that is less than half of what I paid for aftermarket lines ($122).
So as the title says, are aftermarket lines a waste of money?
What do you think?
thanks
nick

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

Interesting. I've cut a lot of old OEM brake hoses and never seen any braided metal under the rubber. There is a fabric layer.

Crown makes SS brake hoses that are pretty cheap and good quality. I've run lots of those. Usually, SS hoses give you a firmer peddle feel. You can feel the difference, but does it stop any shorter? Probably not.

 

[SUBURBAN5]

Interesting. I've cut a lot of old OEM brake hoses and never seen any braided metal under the rubber. There is a fabric layer.

Crown makes SS brake hoses that are pretty cheap and good quality. I've run lots of those. Usually, SS hoses give you a firmer peddle feel. You can feel the difference, but does it stop any shorter? Probably not.

X2 I agree. I've seen mechanics pinch off the lines on my burb and it worked. I wonder if the braided fibers look like metal? Otherwise the stainless lines I bought from Russell were way stiffer to bend then the rubber line..

 

[nick7269]

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There we go, I peeled some more rubber off to show what is under that dry rotted rubber. This is what I am surprised about.

 

[letitsnow]

I think that steel braided lines are better & you aren't wasting your money.

 

[Schurkey]

Everyone calls them "steel braided" hoses.

The steel braid is not the important part. It's the visible part. (Although, the steel braid should be covered by some sort of outer jacket--rubber, PVC, whatever. Older steel braided brake hoses had no outer jacket, there was trouble with road grit getting under the braid and then eroding the soft plastic liner.)

What's important with "steel braided" hose is the Teflon/PTFE liner that the steel braid is supporting.

Your rubber-covered OEM hoses are not likely to have a Teflon / PTFE liner. For the record, while I'm perfectly comfortable gently squeezing a typical "rubber" brake hose to seal it temporarily, you CANNOT SQUEEZE A TEFLON/PTFE LINER HOSE. You will ruin it. The "steel braided" hose is also sensitive to being bent/curved to sharply. There is a minimum "bend radius" for each size of hose. Again, once it's been bent too sharply, it's ruined.

Are the "steel braided/Teflon liner" hoses better than plain ol' ordinary rubber? Racers think so. I think for street use, folks take off ancient/damaged/defective rubber hoses, put on "new" steel-braided hoses, bleed the system, and are very impressed with the improvement. But if they'd installed NEW rubber hoses, most of the "improvement" they noticed is just a matter of not have outright defective hose(s) any more, and having fresh non-contaminated brake fluid.

I put steel braid hoses on my vehicles when the old hoses are at end-of-service-life. I don't remove decent rubber hoses in order to "upgrade" to steel braided.