Should I heat shield my driver's brake line?
 

Should I heat shield my driver's brake line? It's pretty darn close to the turbine and downpipe.

I'm thinking about http://www.summitracing.com/parts/DEI-010472/ DEI Fire sleeve.

http://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS+Performan...32030/10002/-1

http://www.jegs.com/i/Mr.+Gasket/720/8022G/10002/-1

http://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS+Performan...82414/10002/-1

I never had a problem on or off the track.

How close are you talking? Mine was around an inch from the drivers side header.

Fae,

These are two different types of materials intended for different purposes:

1. "Firesleeve" is meant to cover soft lines that carry combustible fluids (fuel, oil, etc.). In the presense of flames, the silicone material chars but does not catch fire. The charring absorbs a great deal of heat from the flames and protects the soft lines. Firesleeve is not, however, a good heat shield. In particular, it doesn't do much for radiated heat (especially in the black color), which is our primary concern around the turbo. I've never seen Firesleeve used on hard lines. Usually, by the time a fire is hot enough to melt or consume hard lines, you've already lost the battle.

2. Heat shielding (the stuff Mike pointed to) is the material to use for cutting down on heat transfer. I'm not sure about its fire resistance, but when it comes to heat transfer, it has a reflective layer for inhibit radiative heat transfer and a little bit of fiberglass insulation to inhibit conductive heat transfer.

I've not seen anyone bother to heat shield the hard brake lines, and Hustler certainly drives hard enough that if it were a problem, he would have seen it. Can't hurt though. Just don't use Firesleeve in that application.

I have a little header wrap on my line in that spot.

Thank you for the information about firesleeve. Obviously, I did not know that. I have some aluminized reflective shield so I will just use that. If hustler doesn't have a problem I don't think I will. There is indeed an air gap but I was thinking that it still must get pretty hot.

I'll bet it does too. Especially since brake fluid doesn't flow.

Note that air gaps are great for cutting down on conductive heat transfer. Conductive heat transfer depends upon the heat transfer constant of the media (in this case, air has a very LOW heat transfer constant, it's a good insulator) and the straight line distance from the heat source.

Radiative heat transfer depends upon the transmissivity of the media (in this case, air has very HIGH transmissivity, it offers virtually no protection against the radiation) and cube of the distance (i.e., distance x distance x distance) because radiation must fill a volume. So, we like to cover anything heat sensitive near a radiative heat source (like a glowing turbo) with something reflective. Bet we don't have to go that far because of the cube of the distance property.

Pontification off. Just FYI.

i relocated mine away from the hot bits that sit very close to the pipe where it passes down the inside of the frame.. very low mounted turbo on mine, so i felt it was best to just move it a bit. Better safe than sorry and it was a very quick fix.

I wrapped mine with some aluminium heat wrap type stuff, not sure if it's necessary but it's easy to do so why not? This is a RHD car so it's a bit different though.

http://racepartsolutions.com/proddet...p?prod=HSP-100

i used one of these shields. it is a foil like material( you can crush it and unravel it back to normal) i just crimped it over all my brake stuff and secured with a wire.

https://www.miataturbo.net/attachmen...ine=1316479452

Thats real purdy. I'm another without any issues, I did wrap my throttle cable in foil tape to reflect a little bit of heat, it gets closer to the turbo than the brake line does.

I've used DEI's gold foil stuff on a .020" aluminum heat shield in similar places before. That or their boom mat would be great for this. The gold stuff looks VERY trick, though. You'll get dudes like crazy.