1977 911 Excessive Brake Pedal Free Play - Solved

[PDX-944]

So I bought my 911 last week, and found that the brake pedal sat a good 2-3 inches above the clutch pedal, and did not actually engage brakes for that 2-3 inches, it was simply free play in the pedal. Adjusting the pushrod moved the pedal but did not affect free play.
I searched for quite some time for an answer and found quite a few people with this issue, yet no one posted an answer if it was ever resolved.
That happens a lot with forums and it's quite frustrating. I didn't know if I was missing a return spring, or a pedal stop, or what was going on.

As I had the booster assembly apart last night I found nothing visually wrong, and found that the slop is between the lever at the top of the push rod and the brake booster, which on this vintage uses a ball and socket arrangement. No obvious way to fix it.
I later found with the help of a friend, that according to the PET, they're is supposed to be a circlip holding the lever to the booster rod. Without this circlip the lever falls back and rests against the plastic grommet found in the front of the housing that the booster mounts to. The pedal is pushed down and until the socket on the lever reaches the ball on the booster, you have no brake.
I will be fixing this soon!
As a quick check for this, there are two plastic grommets residing on the front of the housing that mounts the booster. If you pull the upper grommet, and the lever is resting against the housing, you've found the issue.
Note that later MY 911s use a clevis pin instead of the ball/socket setup.