Hello all,

I am quite new to this forum, but been a mechanic for 35 years, and owned BMW's for 20+. I have to post about job I just finished, and the AWESOME tool I bought!

The whole thing started with using a bleeder ball to do some standard maintenance, and flush the brake fluid. After the car came off my mid-rise lift, I noticed a pool of fluid, and thought it might be a leaking clutch slave cylinder, but after taking out the airbox I found it was bone dry. When I looked underneath, I saw that the rear brake lines had friggin rusted through, right at the first body clip underneath. Looking for replacement lines I found that there is no such thing as pre-bent rear hard lines. I had to make them, but making hard brake lines has always been an issue in the past. To get up and going I only needed to replace a section of the two rear circuit lines, but that would mean I needed a piece with the right ends to connect to the existing lines from the MC, and I needed to create new ends on the replacement and cut lines, so I could use a coupler. The tools I have used in the past haven't done bubble flares well, and I had to work on lines still connected under the car. Getting the existing lines disconnected was a nightmare. I have the right sized metric flare nut wrenches, but the nut end of the lines stripped. I had to attack with PB Blaster, and a variety of tools, but I was able to get them unthreaded from the MC lines. Now I needed to make the new lines, with bubble flares, and it was Titan tools to the rescue! I bought this Titan 51535 tool on Amazon for $50.


The anvil is two sided, and can make a double flare, but using only the OP1 side of the anvil, I ended up with perfectly shaped, leak free bubble flares. Clamping the tool in a vice made flaring the new lines SUPER easy, and flaring the lines still connected under the car was fairly easy as well. You just need to be careful of twisting the end while you hold the handle. If you need to put bubble, or double flares on 3/16" brake line, this 51535 too is the BEST I have ever seen, and used. So with the flaring tool, 50 ft. of copper/nickel brake line, and a set of fittings I ordered off Amazon, I was able to replace just the corroded section of line. It's interesting that the MC lines also use couplers to connect to the rear hard lines, which left me with absolutely no concerns over putting another couple in-line.

Jose