I wanted to ask if any of the 1968 Cutlass/442 models came with a brake vacuum canister?

I am right on the edge of having enough vacuum for power brakes and hoping that a vacuum canister may get me the little extra braking that I need to feel more comfortable after changing out the front drums to 14" disk using the Right Stuff coversion. This weekend, I just bought and have not yet installed a bigger 11" dual diaphram power brake booster and was thinking of going ahead and added a vacuum canister while I had it all apart (again).

Maybe I am just not remembering how the orginal brakes worked and wanting too much for it to be more like a modern, lighter car with 4 wheel disk brakes.

Any other suggestions would be welcomed.

Thanks

Ernie

 

I've never seen one on an A-body but 61-63 Starfires had them. They had a metal tee in the PB vacuum line at the booster. One port went to intake vacuum source, one port to the booster, and third went to the vacuum reservoir stuffed between fenderwell and firewall.

66-69 Toronados had them for the headlight vacuum system but IDK where you'd put the outsized thing on an A-body.

 

Bingo.

 

How much vacuum do you currently have?

My engine initially made borderline vacuum with the 217/221 cam (bouncy 14-ish inches vacuum), and the power brakes were kinda weak. After some tuning that involved increasing the distributor initial advance to 18* and connecting the vacuum advance to manifold vacuum, things are much better. The idle vacuum is a steady 16”, the brakes work perfectly, the idle is smooth, and it doesn’t decrease when the AC is turned on.

 

Thank you for your feedback. I will look into adjusting the timing, it was not something on my list of things to keep trying.

 

Thanks for your comment, I do need to keep this in mind and probably adjust my expectations of a older, heavier car with small disc brakes only on the front.