Aircooled VW South Africa

Hi guys

A friend and his dad built up this 1960 Karmann Ghia, and after driving it for a month his brakes failed yesterday resulting in this mess.

See pics below

Very sad pics

that must cause massive amounts of heartache to the Dad and Son. nothing worse than see all your hours of love and hard work disappear in a second.

So true Dazz

That sucks.

Though with the surface rust under all that filler they were going to be redoing bodywork before very long anyway. Not that makes it any less sucky.....

Any idea what caused the brakes to 'fail'?

Very sad, but this was completely avoidable...

Hydraulic brakes dont just catastrophically fail. Our ACVW brakes, if maintained regularly, and well, will give years of reliable service.

I stand under correction, but we need to assume that the grey Ghia's braking system was not 100% to start off with.
Yep it was raining, but this is always where a shoddy brake system exposes itself. As with most drum braking systems, the routine and meticulous maintenance of your braking system, will avoid costly repairs to your vehicle in the event of an accident where "the brakes just failed"

Also our brakes fail over a period of time.... not immediately. The only thing thats immediate is the crash of your car into the one in front of you and in this case, another rear ending you.

Brake system hydraulics is simple.... the driver pressing the brake pedal to stop. The brake pedal pushes pistons in the master cylinder creating hydraulic pressure. This pressure forces brake fluid into the system. Steel lines and hoses connect the master cylinder to wheel cylinders.
Brake fluid, under pressure, flows into the cylinders and at each wheel. This pressure causes the pistons in each to move, applying the brakes. When we release the brake pedal, the pistons retract and fluid returns to the brake master-cylinder reservoir.

If there is compromise of any sort in this chain, you will sooner or later know about it, as either the brake pedal will become spongy or hard.

Time to have a reliable mechanic check this for you, as braking is more important than any other part of your vehicles operation.

Sorry for the hijack.

Muds

If the Ghia's brakes failed, or locked up on the wet road surface, that would explain all the front end damage. Did the car following the Ghia also experience catastrophic brake failure? Or just following to closely? (adding to the damage in front of the VW....)

...still is a sad picture...

I agree with Muds, so avoidable..
Still a crap thing to happen though, hope they don't lose interest and see this as a chance to do some more work on the car..

Thumper wrote:If the Ghia's brakes failed, or locked up on the wet road surface, that would explain all the front end damage. Did the car following the Ghia also experience catastrophic brake failure? Or just following to closely? (adding to the damage in front of the VW....)

...still is a sad picture...

Most likely due to the brakes failing ,there was not enough pressure to activate the brakelight switch.

Could this have been avoided if a dual circuit master cylinder was installed???

Sorry Muds, even though you are correct, I have to disagree with you

if you have a single circuit and a line pops, then you loose all braking. If you have a dual circuit and a line pops, then you loose half your braking until you run out of fluid, then you loose all braking.

It happened to me once. A hard line chaffed through and if it wasnt for quick reactions and pulling the handbrake as soon as my foot went to the floor, I would have hit the bakkie at the stop street in front of me.

Sometimes, shiv does happen and no-one is to blame - dont rule it out

There was a story about some aftermarket brake light switches popping, causing sudden loss of hydraulic brake pressure.

This all comes back to the old wise "Toppies" brake test.

This is done after you have worked on your brake system, done any setting, or replaced any parts.

You take the car down the drive slowly, and test the brakes under normal braking.

When the car has come to a stop, you hold your foot on the pedal, and slowly release some pressure, but do not let the pedal move back wards.

You then again apply pressure and see that the pedal stops at the same place, if the pedal moves deeper, on every cycle, then you have , and will have brake failure.

If it stays at the same place after 10 or so cycles, then you stand on the brakes as hard as you can, put all your force onto your foot, and hold it there.

Should you have a weak point, you will pop it, rather in your driveway then when you hit an other car. If it breaks, it would have killed you on the road.

All brake systems must be able to take a full stomp on the pedal without negative effect. Thats the only way to pick up potential "brake failure"

Hope I have saved your car or your life.

Herman

Herman
Why is it that most new cars I have driven, if I hold the brake pedal under a fairly light load, the pedal will gradually creep towards the floor? OK, I get boared before I get it to the floor, but still.
Could it be the booster?

Tony Z wrote:Herman
Why is it that most new cars I have driven, if I hold the brake pedal under a fairly light load, the pedal will gradually creep towards the floor? OK, I get boared before I get it to the floor, but still.
Could it be the booster?

You half right there Tony, it is part booster but mainly...

Its to do with the ABS system, which is being bull ted that all wheels are locked, so it releases pressure to the wheels, which allows your foot to float to the floor.

But if your system is OK it should stop before it hits the floor.

Herman

That Ghia didn't come with a booster, so there isn't one unless they fitted one afterwards... Sad to see...