emergency brake cable replacement

[JHHeiger]

I have a buggered up EBrake cable that needed replacement. I took the old one out but had problems removing the threaded end right at the elbow where it leaves the tunnel in the rear. So i cut the cable and pulled it out from the front.

So now i go to install the new cable and the threaded end will not feed through to the front.

Cleaned it, reamed it, drilled on it, even made a flexible cutting edge with the old cable. No help

I took the old cable again and this time began to slowly shorten the threaded end on my grinder to make it short enough to go around a tight corner. It's moving further in, but not by much.

Any tips

How in creation did they get it into the EBrake cable tube at the factory?!

[FJCamper]

Hi,

The problem on both Ghias and Bugs is the cable tubes get bent slightly upward over the years as you use the handbrake.

The fix is to get a foot-long steel punch or rod same diameter as the tube, and from up top side, grease the rod and hammer it down so it straightens the tube as it goes.

Have some good Vise Grips on hand to pull the rod out again.

Once the tube is straight, the cable will pass through easily.

FJC

[Ol'fogasaurus]

The next thing to do, after taking FJ's advice, is to then knot one end of a length of string to a bit less than the dia of the tube, tie the free end to the cable then put the knotted end into the tube and use compressed air to blow the string through the tube. Once through you should be able to easily pull the cable through the tube and on to "glory" . It also works for the clutch and throttle cables. An old but often forgotten trick.

Lee