I am busy with the restoration of my 107 pickup and in this post I’m going to look at putting the series 1 brake pipes on and preparing the brake pipes and then also hopefully the steering column and putting that together
The series 1 brake pipes have been quite a job it’s taken me a few days to get done. I’ve actually re-bent and remade them from scratch. I bought the piping and used a bending tool and a flaring tool. Not having done this before, I’ve had to learn as I went along so it took me a little bit longer than it should. I purchased the front two that joined the two-wheel cylinders on the front hubs because they were just too difficult to bend and my tool just wasn’t going to do that.
Bending brake Pipes
I started off with the brake lines for the rear axle thinking that would be a little bit easier. I did it insitu by connecting it and then bending it as I went along. But it didn’t prove to be the best solution but I carried on and finished it off. But I decided to change my way a little bit after that.
Then I moved on to the front series 1 brake pipes. I tried to measure it and then cut off the piece to make sure that I had the right length or just a little bit longer. Then I marked the bends and bent them separately while it was off the vehicle. That seemed to work out a little bit better.
It took me a while to get the hang of this bending and cutting. It’s a bit tricky because you’ve got to work out exactly where the bend is if you get it wrong then you bend it either too early or too late and then it won’t fit properly.
The next part of the process was to make the ends of the series 1 brake pipes with the flaring tool either into a male connection or into a female connection. The male connection is convex and is a single flare while the female is concave and a double flare. The flaring worked out well and most of the ends look quite good. I will only really know once I connect them up and put brake fluid in and hopefully, i’ve got no leaky connections.
This was a major job done and there was a huge amount of satisfaction actually having bent these pipes now and fitting them and seeing them fit nicely in the whole finished process and seeing it looking good
The last series 1 brake pipes that I did were for the reservoir to the master cylinder and these ones were slightly wider diameter 1/5 vs the 5/16 of the others. This is because the older Series 1 pipes are a wider diameter than the later ones.
Land Rover Series 1 Steering Column
I’ve really made an effort to try and keep the steering column original. I had to buy quite a few new parts for it which has been expensive. But it’s nice to have that original column as it is unique in the sense that it’s got another column that goes down the middle which carries the wires for the dip switch and the hooter. I have been able to keep that intact and got the necessary switches and the hooter assembly. I got some new ball bearings because the ones I had were a little bit pitted and then the ball races were also pitted.
This is the worm and nut type steering column which has just got the nut at the bottom. It doesn’t have the ball race like the later steering columns. Then right on the top of the column it’s got a ball race with 18 little bearings that you tension up to get the float right. The big difference is this one has a hole in the middle which is where you put the steering tube through and the hooter and dip switch wires through.
Other than the ball bearings and the ball race I haven’t actually replaced much on the steering column as everything else seems to be in surprisingly good condition.
I’m going to do a separate post in a little bit more detail about the rest of the steering column.
Watch the full video on how I made the series 1 brake pipes and what I did at my Youtube channel @theoverlandlegend
