Is this a genius mechanic hack or an incredibly dangerous way to fix a brake line?! 🚗🛑 When working on older vehicles with heavily rusted components, metal brake lines and hydraulic fittings often fail to seal correctly. Instead of completely cutting and re-flaring the line—which takes time and expensive tools—some mechanics use a specialized copper flare gasket! By dropping this soft copper cone directly into the fitting before tightening down the nut, the copper crushes and perfectly fills any imperfections in the metal. While this is a recognized repair in HVAC and industrial hydraulics, using it on a car's high-pressure braking system is heavily debated. If that soft copper fails under extreme braking pressure, you could completely lose your ability to stop safely!
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Not controversial? On helicopter blow down bottles we use these as per manual on lines that carry well over 3000psi of nitrogen.
Brother. Just reflare it.
Do it right rebend and flare that line
ITS CALLED A SECO SEAL. THEY ARE GREAT FOR BREMBOS IF YOU TRACK YOUR CAR ALOT AND BLEED YOUR BRAKES FREQUENTLY. I COMBINED THESE WITH SPEED BLEEDERS AND ALUMINUM SECO SEAL TO PREVENT GALVANIC CORROSION.
I did that once, on my 1958 Fordson tractor. fuel line from the Fuel tank to the fuel pump, and from the fuel pump to the fuel filter, were both leaking on the pump side. fittings were worn though and very old and weird, so I just couldn't find a replacement flare to solder on. so we just... put copper washers in there and screwed them on very tight. works flawlessly.
It's zinc and copper coated, just do it right...
High pressure brake line flares are made at a different angle than npt type fittings. The soft copper when tightened will form to the bend. But most copper gaskets I’ve seen aren’t made at the same angle as brake line flares.
Good field fix! Get it to the shop pronto
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Pennies haven't been copper since 1983
Plugging the line, hilarious
That's a strictly get it home/shop fix. Heres an interesting one, quick steel putty sticks will patch a tire long enough to get home too.
I had both my rear brake cylinders fail in the same week years ago. I put a roofing nail in the fittings until I got paid. The head is the perfect size to fit the fittings. Left went first. Put the nail in and the next day or two days later there went the other one. 2 weeks later it dropped a lower ball joint in the front. Thankfully I was doing 5mph when it happened. It was ag great truck but not taken care of by the previous owner (my sister)
Zinc gasket
Hack . Grease and the washer that is not aligned. Go sell your tools. Even better yet just put the tools down and walk away
I don't see why there's a copper gasket on your caliper two of them matter fact
I’m surprised those don’t already have some sort of soft metal gasket to begin with, like it just seems like over engineering that would be standard as a redundancy. Thinking about it like I get it it adds more gaps and takes away thread, so under pressure you’re losing structural integrity, but the gasket should make the fit more flush, right?
I’ve even used copper rtv
It’s a crush washer, good for one use and if you didn’t fit it properly the first time you’re fucked. I take these out of fittings and replace them with a proper flare washer…..
Copper and aluminum will react