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 The
new MINI is great fun---it's cute, it's quick, it's a fun
car to drive on the street. But how about making it into
a track car? John Trevey is an experienced track driver,
having taken his E36 328i to Texas World Speedway many times.
Now he has a new MINI and loves it, but wants to see how
it'll handle the racetrack too. He knows that the car came
with a few compromises for the sake of the average MINI
owner.
For example, John is used
to the brake pedal feel that he has in his BMW---a very
firm pedal. The long original rubber flex hoses that connect
each brake caliper to the steel supply lines are fine for
ordinary civilians, but for those who want a hard brake
pedal right now those soft flex hoses need to be replaced
with braided steel flex lines. This type of hose was originally
used on aircraft brakes and is now used on every race and
serious track car. And now they're available for the new
MINI.
Installation should be pretty
straightforward---it's just a matter of removal of the old
rubber hoses and replacing them with the new ones. That's
what it would be if you were installing a well developed
product that fit properly. This set of lines, on the other
hand, was probably a very early production set that had
not been well tested, because the front
hoses exited the caliper directly into the CV-axle boot
on each side. That hurdle was crossed with an hour of careful
grinding on the calipers that allowed the hoses to be turned
to an angle that cleared the axle. Finally, we flushed the
brake fluid with ATE Super Blue Racing Fluid, and John was
ready to head for the track.
These were Goodridge lines
and we've heard that they recognized the fitting problem
and have corrected it since. We have installed Earl's brand
lines from BMP on our MINI, with no problem at all, and
the results are great---even Debbie likes them.
We have Stainless
Steel Brake Lines for sale here!
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