ShaneLU97

Is this a hard part to find?
Just had a shop replace it on the Vette (my ongoing brake issue but apparently all is well now) and they quoted me a price for the part as 350. When I checked Paragon the part is listed at 175...Whoa a 100% mark-up. So I call the guy back and he tells me the reason it is so high is that part was discontinued and the part cost is skyrocketing.

Any truth to this? Sound right or should I call shenanigans? Any alternate sources for them? Rebuild kits? Etc?

Thanks
Shane

wcsinx

It's $115 after core at Ecklers

http://www.ecklers.com/product.asp?p...3TJGED4HSC5MNE

And it's also not entirely necessary. They're meant to keep the rears from locking up under heavy braking, but a lot of guys here have bypassed them as they can be troublesome.

Tom73

Just look at The Last Detail (www.tld-corvette.com) and they only show a rebuilt one for the '73, it is $95 exchange. Do not list a new one.

Here is the pic they show for it. Is this it?



tom...

Mike Ward

This has been beaten to death, but the valve on a '73 is NOT A PROPORTIONING VALVE.

It's also highly unlikely that anyone would need a new one. The old one is probably serviceable as-is or can easily be rebuilt.

wcsinx

It varies from year to year. I know for a fact the one on my '76 is a proportioning valve. I've proved this to myself. On other years it's just a distribution block/light switch.

joe73vette

They added the proportioning valve to the block starting in 1974. Joe

wcsinx

Also I believe 67-69 (or maybe just 69?) used a manually adjustable prop. valve instead of the fixed adjustment valves that were employed later on.

68/70Vette

Inlinetube.com has new distribution and proportioning blocks for older cars in stock. Maybe they have the one you need.

pws69

Not in 69 for sure.

pws69

When a car has a porportioning valve, it is usually VERY necessary. They are used to compensate when there is a large disparity in the size (= hydraulic pressure) of the slave cylinders front to back.

When a car has a distribution block, the CAN be bypassed but it is not a very wise thing to do, especially for street machines, because you then reduce your braking system to one in which a single point of failure causes malfunction of the entire system. When you have either the front OR the back functional (which is the purpose of the distribution block), you at least have a fighting chance of stopping - unlike the practically ZERO chance of stopping with the so-called "Emergency Brake"....

wcsinx

I thought the slaves were consistent in size through all C3's? Which is to say they're already biased to the front as they should be. I know for a fact that in some years it is nothing more than a distribution block & light switch and other years it's a dist. block, prop valve, and light switch. According to Joe73 up there, they weren't even added to the block until '74, but I would venture a guess that the rest of braking system remained essentially unchanged.

By bypassing I meant isolating the front and rear circuits without the distribution block. As in the front line from the MC T's to the two front wheels. And the rear line from the MC T's to the two rear wheels. This is actually more safe than having that part in there. If it's functioning properly, the valve is actually supposed to block off the front or rear circuit (and also turn on the idiot light) in the event of pressure loss. But from what I've heard, this valve in and of itself is more often than not the source of the failure.