Only buy master cylinders from reputable suppliers. I prefer the Girling ones myself. Not cheap but they work every time and never have issues. As I’m hurtling towards a downhill, decreasing radius, off camber curve, I’d prefer a slightly thinner wallet and confidence in my brakes.
I completely agree with caution on master cylinders. We have quite a few hills here too
. It seems that TRW is the new name for Girling, since taking over Lucas Girling in 1999 (JBCollier pointed out Lockheed as well in another post). Presumably anything with Girling on it though is past it's best already at 20 years old, and will potentially need a new seal kit anyway. All seal kits I see seem to be brander Girling and thus old stock, or unbranded. TRW don't seem to manufacture master cylinders anymore for this car according to their website, although some suppliers should have stock. To complicate things further, this car is one of the Type 54's originally supplied in 1969 with a 1.6 Crossflow 807 and white instead of yellow indicators, although they seem to work as side lights. It is not a US car. Does that mean parts marked "not suitable for US cars" will be the ones I want?
I have heard horror stories about generic ebay aftermarket wheel cylinders for other makes being machined well out of factory spec from new, and poor quality on top. Can't help but worry about the non genuine seals after SwiftDB4's post.
Also, the calipers and pads on this car look old and unused (probably asbestos pads, I found a very old box for the pads, which didn't mention asbestos free or have warnings), as do the front dampers which look aged but new. The car has been off the road for 40 odd years now. It was pretty dry, the chrome is near perfect. It would be sensible to pop fresh seals in the calipers at a minimum, but then would fresh Chinese ones or old stock Girlings be as good as what is in there? I will have to take a very close look and start measuring bore sizes! I guess I need to know what master cylinder bore size the car has at the very least before I look for a TRW cylinder.
The manual page links are very useful thanks. Those wiring diagrams look ace.