Difference in brake hose brands?

[nthach]

Originally Posted by Trav

On the other hand I have used others for more money and found them to be nothing more than poorly made cheap crap but hey it had the Gates name on it.

Gates seems to relabel a lot of Edelmann/Plews for PS lines and pump/gear reseal kits. The former was made in Mexico and the latter Taiwan or China. No comment on the reseal kits as I never used one(I prefer OEM for seal kits, I don't have an account at Transtar to get Transtec or other brands). The Gates hose I installed was nothing like the OEM one, I had to wrangle it a bit to install it.

 

[nthach]

Originally Posted by slacktide_bitog
There is nothing wrong with Sunsong, and they are now an OE supplier

I wouldn't be surprised if a Tesla comes with Sunsong as stock for brake lines. I've seen their lines on Chinese or Taiwanese scooters.

 

[BLUE82]

One of the hard lines on my Durango failed, so I decided to let a professional perform the repair, and replace the OE hoses at the same time. I ordered Raybestos for the front and ACDelco for the rear. The boxes all indicated Chinese origin, but that was as far as I looked. Now that the job is done, I can clearly see the name Sunsong imprinted on the hoses. I know rebranding is common but didn't think I'd bought rebranded parts. Regardless of brand, though I'd prefer made in the US (or at least somewhere in the Americas), if people here are happy with them then fine by me. The only difference I could see (besides price) is that Raybestos parts have a "limited lifetime" warranty.

 

[kschachn]

Sunsong is an OEM manufacturer for some brands such as Toyota. For the times I've used Sunsong parts I was very pleased with the quality.

 

[Chris142]

I may or may not have ever replaced a brake hose . ( In 50 years . )

Can not remember for sure . But I do not live in the salt / rust belt . I do , however live in the sun belt . Does any of that make a difference ?

Same. They rarely fail unless damaged. In my nearly 40 years doing auto repair I think I've replaced 3-4 hoses.

 

[Trav]

Some German TUV inspectors have a thing for brake hoses over 6-7 years old, in the NE the salt and cold causes many of them to crack and deteriorate at about that time. You cannot always see the damage, it is inside the hose.
I use the IPA tool every brake job to test the system pressure, if the pressure doesnt drop almost instantly the hose is probably the problem. I find it very worthwhile made in the USA tool.

https://www.amazon.com/IPA-Tools-Innovative-Products-7884/dp/B000850MZK

 

[BLUE82]

Same. They rarely fail unless damaged. In my nearly 40 years doing auto repair I think I've replaced 3-4 hoses.

I've never had a hose fail, either, but my cars are "old" and "older"... the Durango is a '01 and this was the second hard line failure in 3 years. The first time was a different line but that failed in a parking lot. This time around I was moving about 35 mph and barely stopped in-time with what brakes I had left. In my view it was time to replace the rest of the OE parts - well, almost. The master cylinder and the booster are still OE.

 

[Chris142]

The ones on my 87 are still original

I've never had a hose fail, either, but my cars are "old" and "older"... the Durango is a '01 and this was the second hard line failure in 3 years. The first time was a different line but that failed in a parking lot. This time around I was moving about 35 mph and barely stopped in-time with what brakes I had left. In my view it was time to replace the rest of the OE parts - well, almost. The master cylinder and the booster are still OE.

 

[paulo57509]

I think most brake hose brands are fine. The unknown is how long they last which is dependent on a lot of factors.

I had the right, inner rear hose fail on the Legend. It's alarming at first but the short drive from the park-and-ride lot to home was pretty uneventful. There was enough pedal to stop the car.

Best I could tell from the maintenance records, it was an original hose (24 years old, 409,836 miles). ALL the hoses got replaced that weekend; Raybestos, I don't recall the country of origin.

 

[willbur]

I have an odd question. Has any one ever noticed a difference is build quality or performance in different brands of rubber brake hose?
OE Motorcraft
AC Delco
Raybestos
Sunsong
The sunsong ones are extremely cheap on rock auto and I'm not really interested in those.