• Hey Guest!
    British Car Forum has been supporting enthusiasts for over 25 years by providing a great place to share our love for British cars. You can support our efforts by upgrading your membership for less than the dues of most car clubs. There are some perks with a member upgrade!

    **Upgrade Now**
    (PS: Upgraded members don't see this banner, nor will you see the Google ads that appear on the site.)
Tips
Tips

A New Use for Bicycle Brake Parts

Sarastro

Yoda
Silver
Country flag
Offline
Today I gave Ruby Redcar (she has a name, now) her first post-restoration oil change. I noticed that the seal on the bottom of the oil-filter cannister was a badly made, rubber washer--when I tried to tighten the bolt, it just distorted and obviously would have leaked if I'd trusted it. I don't know why it held at all for the car's first 1000 miles.

I ordered some new ones from the usual sources. But then I started looking around the garage for something that would do, for the moment. Now, I have a huge bag of o-rings for the adjusters used on Campagnolo bicycle brakes that were common in the 1970s and into the 80s. The adjuster has an o-ring that simply provides a place for you to grip it; just a standard size o-ring, nothing special. If you want to buy these, you can get them for about $5/pair from people who stock old-bike parts. Some time ago, I found the closest English size (original was metric, for sure) and bought a bag of 1000 for about $20. Since then, I've been making myself popular with other classic-bike fanatics by giving these away right and left--at $0.02 each, it's a cheap way to ingratiate myself with others.

Believe it or not, these o-rings fit perfectly for the seal at the bottom of the cannister. There is a depression in the metal end piece, item 10 in the picture below, into which the o-ring fits perfectly. It seals nicely against both the bolt and the cannister housing, with just the right amount of compression.

The seal is item 9 in the picture, below--I have the Purolator filter, not the Tecalemit. I don't know if the original seal I had was correct--probably not, considering its lousy fit. But the o-ring seems perfect. I took the car out for about a 30-mile drive this afternoon, and everything is holding well.

The o-rings are size 2-204, which I bought from Marco Rubber Co., https://www.marcorubber.com. Mine are Buna-N (AKA Nitrile) which has good resistance to petroleum (but not brake fluid). Viton is OK, too, resists all kinds of petroleum products, and handles 400F temperatures (Buna-N is good to 250F). But Viton is a lot more expensive.

If anyone needs or wants to try some of these, send me your address at shotnoise99@yahoo.com, and I'll drop a couple in an envelope and mail them to you.
 
Steve, that's just great! Campi and BMC.

Thank you for passing that on.
 
Back
Top