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10/05/23: I hit a bit of a milestone today as all brake lines are run and the system is now bled with no leaks. I had a few issues but managed to work thru them.

I have a vacuum bleeder from HF that hooks up to a air hose. I’ve used it several times with mixed results. I kept seeing air bubbles in the line and wasn’t sure if the vacuum on the bleed valve wasn’t introducing air from the threads. After bleeding the two back brakes, the passenger side and starting on the drivers, I ran out of brake fluid. I had previously bought a quart bottle thinking that would be enough but one of the lines had a small leak introducing a tiny bit of air causing me to keep bleeding.

So a trip to my not so local FLAPS, about twenty five minutes away and I was back in business. I decided to do it the old fashioned way with my wife manning the brake pedal and me the bleeders. At least that way I took the possible bleeder thread leak out of the equation. With my wife pumping the brakes, I spotted the leak causing all of the issues. A little snugging up on the fitting and the bleeding proceeded without a hitch. With the vacuum bleeder it never developed pressure so I never saw the leak.

Next up is to supply the vacuum to the booster. I still haven’t decided on where I’m getting vacuum from. I have a vacuum wiper and a PCV attached to the manifold. I don’t really want to remove the manifolds to drill and tap another hole for a fitting (not enough room for a regular drill and I don’t own a 90° drill) so I decided, just to test it out I would use the existing connection for the wipers. If it works, I may just add a vacuum pump solely for the wipers. That would eliminate allot issues.

None of my FLAPS seem to have vacuum hose. Plenty of gas hose, which is what the suggest I use. Seems strange to me. I would really prefer to run the majority with 3/8” CuNi tubing and use the hose as a coupling between the engine and the firewall and at the booster. They didn’t have any 3/8” tubing either. Unfortunately, other commitments will make me table this project for a few weeks. At least I feel good about where I’m at with this project.