After many months of searching, I finally have replacement brake lines for the Pike 1949 Maxim fire truck. A long time ago – was it September? – several of my Brothers were driving the truck around the grounds when the brakes failed. It is unclear whether the brake line was severed by the resulting crash or whether the severed line caused the crash. Either way, the fire truck got well acquainted with a medium-sized wooden plant. That relationship left nobody satisfied, as the outcome was a bent bumper and a horizontal tree.

The ensuing hunt for replacement brake lines proved more arduous than even the protracted quest for a clutch master cylinder, which we needed to fix our other fire truck. While I found the clutch master cylinder after only three months of searching, the brake lines have proven enigmatic – until now.

During my jaunt to Indiana, I picked up the severed brake lines for the Maxim. Earlier in the year, we determined that nobody in the Terre Haute area could help with replacement parts. Fed up with the ineptitude of the Terre Haute shops (I mean, one would think that a hydraulic hose shop would be able to make brake lines, but nooooo…), I took the severed lines home with me on the return leg of my weekend road trip. I brought them to Brake and Equipment Warehouse in Minneapolis, hoping that the required fittings were still in existence. Rob, in the Shop, said, “No problem!” and today I picked up two brand-new, custom-made brake hoses.

I’m looking forward to getting back to Rose to install the lines on the fire truck and play with the hydraulic ladder. Fun fun fun!