sbalmos

Well Known Member
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I'm in the midst of building up my brake pedals, and was fitting them to the rudder pedal tubes in order to set the location of the master cylinder bolt hole on each pedal. Mind you I'm using the Beringer system, but my gut tells me this might occur with the stock Matco cylinders also?

As you can see, sort of, in this first picture, the diameter of the piston return spring of the cylinder is up against the rudder pedal tubing. This is causing the cylinder to be pushed "out" / aft-ward quite far. It's to the point, where if you mentally project the location of the bolt hole in the brake pedal based on the location of the rod end bearing (nearest my hand palm), I don't know if there will be edge clearance. And I'm putting quite a bit of force on the rod end with my hand just to get it into that position.

IMAG0225.jpg


On the other hand, if I flip the installation of the master cylinder, such that the spring / piston end is the end that connects to the brake pedal, then the projected location of the bolt hole is *much* better. Then we're only dealing with shimming the bolt up with a boatload of washers (which the Vans plans mention anyway - washers "as required" I think it says).

IMAG0226.jpg


Does this seem okay, to install the master cylinders essentially upside-down? Has this spring interference been seen in the Matco cylinders, or any of my other Beringer-using brethren? Thanks!
 
There is a spacer that comes with the Beringer but it was not enough. I ended up going up a bolt length to accommodate the extra washers. I'll try to get a pic up tonight.
 
So, yeah, I've had a few people PM and email me that they installed their master cylinders upside-down, as I was proposing, and it worked out fine. I test-fit my cylinders that way, and things look okay. 5 washers to provide spacing on the bolt. Not sure whether or not to go up the next size bolt or not - I can still get the cotter pin through the bolt hole, just barely. But at least everything's fitting properly.