Frank Clarici wrote:
>
> ...Amy is "one of the guys" she drives a Bugeye with a nicly modified 1275,
> cam, Weber side draught, LCB header, etc. and she drives it at around 90
> MPH! I know this for a fact.
Ahem. Just once. Really. And that was on a deserted road in the
middle of the night. Furthermore, a GM experimental car (a Corvette),
containing a friend, was following me. In case you've heard the rumors,
they're true. The bonnet can and will fly up once you reach a certain
speed.
> She will also be the one to inform us as to the mixing capabilities of
> dot 4 and dot 5 brake fluid.
> Her Sprite is the current test model to see just how well or if the 2
> brake fluids mix.
I didn't choose to do this. A trip across the Smokies and back made it
a necessity. On the return trip the brake pedal started acting funny,
going down but not coming back up. Yep, low on fluid. A fellow club
member had brake fluid, but it was dot 5. We had no other choice but to
pour it in and hope that that was what was already in there. It
wasn't. Thus far there have been no problems, but I haven't driven the
car much at all because I'm leery. Can someone tell me (and Frank and
everyone else I've asked) just why you can't mix dot 4 and dot 5?
Everyone says they can't be mixed, but no one can tell me why. If dot 4
does the job and dot 5 does the job and they happen to wind up in there
together, what horrible thing happens? Do they, in combination, become
corrosive? Do they lose all sense of what they were intended for and
magically turn into a gas? Do they explode? Do they bad-mouth me to my
friends and get me rejected from the finest social circles? What?!
The brakes are still working, but I plan to bleed them and put Castrol
LMA in there. Unless I replace the entire braking system, I realize
that a little dot 5 will remain. Will that be a problem?
I also realize that brake fluid doesn't just disappear. The search for
the leak is on.
> Amy...How are the brakes on Healium? Did you change the fluid yet?
Not just yet, but I spent yesterday moving the project cars into a
warehouse where I'll work on them over the winter. I would have changed
the fluid -- and probably the oil, too -- if I hadn't been busy
transporting cars.
Afraid to be a guinea pig,
Amy
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