I'm sure many of you already know about the common failure with the rear brake lines on Passat, MKIV's, A6's etc. Basically they have aluminium crush washers fitted which corrode after a few years, giving a slow leak but can give out completely causing a loss of brakes (I'm surprised this was never an official recall). I need to do this on my 98 Passat TDI however I'm wondering whether to go for new washers or just get a new brake line. Does anyone know which size copper washers to get? It would be handy to buy them before stripping it down so I don't have to leave the car in the air and go hunting round for washers...
Ok well I removed these today and I can confirm that the size is 12mm ID x 17mm OD x 1.5mm Thickness. The actual measurements were 12.2mm ID, 16.7mm OD and 1.3mm thick but this is after being crushed down. For now I have replaced them with copper washers which aren't the correct size and thus there appears to be a tiny leak still there, though it is better than it was. I will look to replace these with some of the correct size as soon as I can get my hands one some. i would rather go with copper if I can to avoid the corrosion problem in future, however aluminium ones may be easier to find. I will probably turn some aluminium ones at work next week and fit them if I can't find any anywhere. I certianly didn't want to be buying new rear flex hoses just because of the washers...
Yep just found some M12 x 18 x 1.5 copper ones on ebay for a couple of quicd so they should do the trick
Update: Got the new ones which were the correct size, however the first set I fitted turned out to be fine anyway so left them on.
