I think my brake booster is goin'

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Eric Winkworth

Eric Winkworth

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Feb 28, 2005
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Hey Guy's


I am getting a bit of hissing at certain points of pedal travel, when using my brakes. Sometimes when I use the clutch and brake a couple times quickly, I notice the pedals firm right up like I am low on vacuum. Is this a tell tale sign of a bad booster?

Any idea on the best deal on one? I know ENS and cruiserpart.net have em, but they sure seem spendy! I guess this one did last oooooooo, 31 years, so hard to complain to much.
 
hey mate,same thing happened to me,brakes made a hissing sound and eventually the booster gave up at the top of a hill,i ended up having water in my booster,i thought it was vacuum but was just a bad booster, not sure if the bj70 came out with the 2 different sized boosters in your part of the world(the larger one you have to remove the clutch master to get it off)i replaced mine with the larger 3b booster and the brakes preform alot better with the 35 inch tyres....pulls up really well now
 
newFJBooster1.webp
 
Mine also went wonky. Bought a rebuilt early 80 series booter with dual diaphragms. Much much better performance.
I should have installed an oversized vacuum reservoir to deal with the greater demand.
Does your vacuum brake light come on all the tme?
 
Awesome replies guys thanks . Its is definitely fubAred. Ensindustrial can get me a new unit for 700 Canadian which isn't bad considering some of the other prices I've seen on the units. That's for the one made for the truck. I know for the last ten years braking performance has been amazing until this happened.

I order stuff from cruiser parts.net and sometimes they are amazing because they get Toyota parts many people would say don't exsist. And sometimes it takes a year to get them lol. I have been impressed with ENS industrial Mark is a great guy gets back to me quick will put big parts on the greyhound. They will be getting a lot of business from me.

I did get the idiot light on a couple times yesterday on a long drive I did. I was thinkin ohh s*** fluid leak, didn't realize low vac will do it too that's great to know! I will stick with the stock resivor for now. Will see how the new unit performs.

Cheers
 
Brake warnng light is triggered by low vac or hand brake on or low fluid.
 
So if the brake booster is going bad, it will trigger the brake light on the cluster? On occasion, mine will come on but will go right off after I take the brake fluid reservoir cap off and right back on. Fluid level is fine, brakes are fine and seems like the booster is fine. Maybe I just have a bad cap on the reservoir?
 
There is a pressure switch mounted on the brake vacuum reservoir... not enough vacuum in that can makes the light come on.

Low fluid can trigger the light too. I unplugged it at the reservoir to pinpoint problem. I have to fill my brake fluid reservoir way up to get the light to go out.

Hand brake lever up will make the light come on also. 3 triggers possible in all.
 
The hand brake was the first thing I looked at but I am pretty certain that is not it. When the hand brake is engaged, the light just gets much brighter...and when dis-engaged...the light stays on but just not as bright.

I am guessing I need to do what you said: fill the reservoir all the way up and see if that works.

It doesn't happen very often and usually just an quick on/off of the reservoir cap will make the light go off for awhile but it still gets annoying after awhile.
 
I filled the thing all the way up a little bit past the full line. Haven't had any issue with the light since then. Thanks jblueridge!
 
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