Hey Mr. Kilmer what doo you think about salt corrosion? I have a 07' Mercedes ML320 diesel. The car came from New Jersey and the steel brake hard lines are corroded. Apparently, they had a recall on some of the models brake lines because of premature corrosion but this one was not included. How do you feel about copper-nickel lines versus the OEM steel lines? there supposed to be DOT approved. Also, the line use the DIN (bubble flair) line ends. The dealer wants my right arm for all new OEM lines.
I always use NiCopp (nickel-copper alloy, not plain copper which is too soft) for brake lines. The stuff is very easy to bend and flare, and it won't rust. Costs more but it's worth it. There are flaring tools available that will make bubble flares.
Well, of course they wouldn't corrode The only thing is it's often illegal to use copper lines because it can theoretically stretch.
Go with Nickel-Copper alloy, you can easily bend the stuff by hand, and the dissimilar metals keep the copper from stretching. The small amount of nickel in the copper basically keeps the tube from being too soft, but allows it to be soft enough to bend. Nickel itself is very hard. Auto parts stores carry pre-fitted lines in varying lengths if you don't want to flare lines yourself. I'm not particularly good at flaring lines, it comes with practice. I just bought the premade nickel-copper lines when I redid the brake lines in my old Pontiac last year. Any mechanic can flare lines and install nickel-copper lines. I had a rear brake line in my truck bust last year as well, I took it to our mechanic because it was way too long to fix with the pre-made stuff.
