A friend came over to replace his rear caliper this morning. He got all of the necessary parts from FCPGroton. Unfortunately, he got the right rear caliper instead of the left rear. So back to square one.

Now, I couldn't get the hard brake line off the rear caliper. The nut wouldn't budge. I even bought an 11mm wrench! Tapping with a hammer (on the wrench) didn't help any. I ran a little PB Blaster under the nut, no luck.

What am I doing wrong. I never had a caliper off before.

Klaus

I had the same problem on my S70 except I actually rounded off the nut going to the calipher. I bought a new brake line from the dealer (about $40)and a tube bender from Harbor freight (about $8) and a set of box end wrenches from Harbor Freigt that included a 11mm wrench. I used my Dremel to cut a chunk of metal off the box end of the 11mm wrench large enough to slip through the brake line. I sprayed the brake line nut with pbblaster. I used my customized wrench to remove the brake line around the differential. This worked very well. Then I used the tube bender to make the new brake line match the original brake line. The new brake line was not shaped at all-just a straight line. Once I torqued the new calipher on and attached the new line, I used my minivac to bleed the brake. Everything seems to work well now.
--
1998 Volvo S70

Before you use brute force, try heating it up. Have a brake line on hand when you do resort to vicegrips.
--
'96 855R,'64 PV544 driver, '67 P1800 basket case, '95 855, '95 854, the first three are mine, heh, heh, 435,000 miles put on 9 bricks

There are no guarantees.

I did rear calipers on my '96 and the driver's side caliper fitting was frozen despite many hours (even days) of soaking. I used a SnapOn metric flarenut wrench (as good a tool as one can use in this situation), and the fitting ripped apart coming out.

I spent many, many hours very carefully removing what remained and I finally got down to a small portion of one thread that could not be removed, even with my strongest picks. That little piece of fitting thread was inalterably fused to the caliper. I probably could have removed this piece with a tap, but I would have needed a bottoming-tap of that particular thread, which I did not have.

Ultimately, I had to toss the caliper.

Thanks for the words of encouragement !! In this case, the caliper is being recycled anyway due to a frozen piston, I just want to ensure that I do not hurt the flare nut and brake line. We are on a tight budget here.

Perhaps a Craftsman 11mm flare wrench... and light tapping with a 16oz hammer? Either that or vice-grips and gorilla tactics :)

Klaus

Klaus, HI, I never thought to see the day!

Thanks for all your help in the past...

I did my 850T5 hoses on Sunday and sweated sugar lumps getting the nuts to undo...

As we cannot get pbblaster over here in UK, I used plus-gas release oil and a BLOW TORCH... then chucked cold water on the assembly to "shock" it.

Still no budge, so repeated the whole procedure.

Finnnnnnnnalllly, it yielded, but not before rounding off two sides of the hex, and having to resort to using a big vice grip to hold the pipe nut.

Before mounting the new hoses, I applied a smidtch of copper grease to the thread to prevent it binding in future...

Boy, I was worried though.

As I had the baby up on the axlestands, I took the opportunity to do a tranny flush and refill - so now I feel as holy as a saint.

Cheers

Andy (alias Flame Trap UK)

--
Flame Trap UK

I have a special Vice Grip that works great for such problems. It has a hex recess instead of the normal jaws. Works great for brake line nuts. If the thread is frozen the flare nut will sheer and you will have to reflare or replace the line. I just did that while replacing the front brake rubber hoses. Talk about a tight place to work.
Good luck.
--
Tom 69-1800S, 72-1800ES, 96-850T,2000-S70 GLT-SE

Tom,
I just re-read your post where you mention a hex vice grip. Could you let us know where you found such a tool? It could come in real handy one of these days.
Thanks,
Klaus
--
Please answer, we need to know if the advice is good or bad. The 164 has a new home, all I am left with are 2 turbos :)

Bummer,
I just talked to my favorite mechanic at Borton Volvo. His answer was heat! The flare could have bonded to the nut or the nut bonded to the caliper, or both. He said that if I try to force it, I will probably have to buy a new line and flair nut.
Someone suggestedd that I just cut the line next to the nut, get a new nut and flare the line. Great idea, but over my head and ability.
And I am not going to torch my garage!!

Klaus

Wow Klaus, I can't beleive I'm giving YOU advice! ( That's not meant to be sarcastic, it's just you seem to know SO much about Volvos)

But as a veteran of round fenders, both Volvo and Studebaker, I am accustomed to stuck fastenters.

So far the advice about heat is right on, (needless to say, do not melt the rubber hoses), but then after heating, shock the fitting with a blast of penetrating oil (have a some way of getting the small flames out, baking soda works well). I personally do not care for PB Blaster for long term soaking of fasteners, but it works here well.

Use either a flare nut wrench or the hex vise grips, and it should come loose.

BTW, I did not know about those vise grips, but gonna go get some real soon!

Ron