Have any of you ever used an electric brake booster. I thought I had all my brake problems solved on this 57 Retractable, but there is a little grimlin hiding in there some where. I have 15+ in of vacuum and can lock the brakes up and stop with ease at 30 to 70 with no trouble. How ever at lower speed say stop light to stop light it is very scary, we have tryed everything we can think of but keep striking out. I am running a stock 312 automatic with a 550 holley street avenger carb. So as a long shot thought this electric booster may solve my problem. Just don't want to spend the money if they don't work very well. Thanks
I still think your shoes are not arced well enough to match the drums. If they were to match the drums perfectly, like back in the day when the shoes were "shaved" or arced to match the drum, you would be pulling your nose off the steering wheel.
But then we discussed this in the shop last time I was by to see you.
This is of no help to you Alvin. Back in the day, I had one that I never did get to stop satisfactorily. I had a great pedal but hitting the pedal while moving was like down shifting from drive into second. It made for a couple thrilling rides.
Have you looked at the check valve going to the booster to make sure it's working? And, have you tested the booster to make sure it's not leaking? Sounds like things work well under "very high" vacuum (i.e. decels above 30MPH). But, not so well at lower "idle" vacuum levels?
Also, you mention stoplight-to-stoplight. Do you notice the performance slowly getting worse at each stop?
The electric booster pump could help assuming there aren't other issues with the system. Just be warned, I don't think I've seen any that don't make a lot of "noise" when they're running. Even with extensive padding in the mounts, it still very obvious when the pump kicks on. Not sure if that would be a show stopper (see what I did there, sorry...) for you.