[rant]
Is there a real reason why there are so many different types of fittings / thread types for brake lines. (note I am not talking line size here)
In my wife's mustang there are 4 different types of fittings between the master and the soft lines going to the caliper. Mind you these are all using 3/16" line. I am sure it is so when the car is being assembled that they can not install the wrong line in to the wrong place on the master and the proportioning valve but come one!!!! This is just nuts.
I would really like some one "in the know" to explain this to me.
[/rant]
Ok I fell better now. 
No, that's it. Ease of assembly/maintenance.
GM actually color-codes them in addition to having different thread size/pitch!
On Fords the sizes changed over the years as well. When i was revising the brake system on my Mustang race car I went to the pick-n-pull and removed as many brake line fitting from the masters and Prop valves as I could find. I just cut the lines with side cutters as I only wanted the fittings. They have come in handy over the years.
Try taking apart a 4th-gen Camaro sometime. I swear, anyone who needed an electrical connector designed one from scratch. I've never seen so many different types of connectors on a car. Not just slightly different to prevent accidental cross-connection, but with different latching systems, different layouts, different amounts of weatherproofing...
I have a drawer full of weird brake line fittings on snipped lines as well. Useful drawer to have.
Keith wrote:
Try taking apart a 4th-gen Camaro sometime. I swear, anyone who needed an electrical connector designed one from scratch. I've never seen so many different types of connectors on a car. Not just slightly different to prevent accidental cross-connection, but with different latching systems, different layouts, different amounts of weatherproofing...
That's a bad thing?
I have an MC2 engine sitting on a stand, and its wiring harness in a box. Looking at it, it seems like Audi used only ONE type of 3-pin connector. To make things more entertaining, it uses two crank sensors and they are both identical and mounted an inch apart.
It's a bad thing. On a Miata, all the connectors share the same design philosophy. You know how to disconnect one, you know how to disconnect them all. Yeah, they screwed up in 1995-97 (I think) and used the same connector for the CAS and the coils - but it's almost impossible to plug one of the harnesses together incorrectly otherwise.
On the Camaro, every new connector is a new adventure in trying to figure out how the heck to get it apart. Some of them even have multiple levels of locking mechanism. It's really annoying and really disrupts your work flow. Kinda like a vehicle that was manufactured with Whitworth, metric and "standard" fasteners, as I'm pretty sure is the case with a couple of Land Rovers...
It's not that bad. Ultra-critical connectors (bulkhead connectors and PCM connectors) bolt in, really critical connectors have the blue pin you pull out before you can pull the tab up, and normal connectors just have the tab.
I'm in the middle of an LS1 engine job, so this is all very clear in my mind Thing had to come out the bottom as one big assembly, transmission, wiring harness, and suspension attached. Fortunately only two small connectors go through the firewall, rather unlike Mazda elected to do the RX-7s.
It's not like, say, Chrysler, where you either have to pull up on a tab, or push down on a tab, or slide a lock to the side before you can (pull or push), or slide a lock up before you can (pull/push), or slide a lock DOWN before you can pry out on the tabs with a pick. F'ing H-block sensor, took me a couple minutes to figure that one out.
Or late model Nissans, where you first have to soak the connector in penetrating oil or else the slide-lock won't even budge.
I will admit to not hating VW/Audi so much after I realized that their connectors come right apart if you push them together while depressing the tab. Come apart like nobody's business. Assuming that somebody hasn't broken the tab and zip-tied the connector together.
Mine had to come out the bottom as well. But I wasn't sure how much of the harness I needed, so I kept going and pulled a bunch out of the interior. My description would be the same as your description of Chrysler products.
At least on this '00, there's just two on the inside, from the factory anyway.
Mine's a '98 and I took it further apart than yours from the sounds of things. The dash is out, I have the instruments in a box, etc.
Ours was just a crankshaft repair. This meant unplugging the wiring harness along with "a couple" hoses, dropping the engine, trans, and subframe out as one big ungainly assembly. Then the unwrapping begins. You have to remove the turbos in order to remove the transmission and the accessories, and you have to remove the accessories in order to get at the motor mounts, and only then can you actually start pulling the engine apart. But at least assembly is just the reverse of removal, right?
