[pne]

I'd like to think of myself as a pretty competent wrench, but I have never been able to get a good bleed on my brakes. I can get a firm lever no problem, but I want a rock hard lever. I've tried out a few local racer's bikes, and some of them have incredibly hard levers once the travel stops. I mean solid, like the lever just hit a brick wall or metal stop. With my brake lever, you can really reef on it and wrestle it almost down to the grip. On their bikes, you'd probably bend the lever before you got it to budge past the engagement point.

So what am I doing wrong here? I'd tried the traditional bleeding method, tried reverse bleeding with a big syringe, bench bleeding with the calipers above the MC, tapping the brake lines and cracking the banjo bolt on the MC to bleed it there, vaccuum bleeding, tying the lever down overnight, etc. I am out of ideas, and I'm starting to think this is just a black art. Either that or there is some flex in my SS brake lines that I'm not aware of. ??????

 

[cirsory]

i feel its a bit of a hit or miss. sometimes i can get it, sometimes i can't.

 

[dubtecv2]

There's a lot more at play here...type of SS lines (not all are created equal), type of fluid, master cylinder, type of calipers, etc.

 

[tk1971]

You can use the blitzkrieg approach: 1) Use a vacuum bleeder; 2) Use Speedbleeders (to eliminate the possibility of any air going back in, since they are in essence one way valves); 3) With vacuum applied, pump the brake lever too (but make sure you keep filling up that reservoir); 4) Remove vacuum and bleed normally, and when you pump that lever, tighten the bleed valve before you reach the end of the stroke. You should not see any air in the bleed line.

At least, that's what I do..

tk

 

[herbn]

funny i was thinking you should try voodoo, then you mentioned black art, i read this thread hoping there would be some info on here for me. I just started trying to put fluid in my new system today all day long i've had an open reservoir full of fluid connected to a brembo lever with it's bleeder valve open and braided steel lines with calipers with open bleed valves and hoses attached, nothin,, tommorrow i clean out my fork fluid syringe and try pulling fluid by vacuum from the calipers bleed lines. I'll take any lever feel though firm is prefered ,all my experience is with prefilled bicycle hydrolics,hayes and hope tech.Monday i call spires were i bought my perhaps a bit outdated brembo(non folding) lever and brakel lines/pads at pretty much top dollar, right now i got a bit of buyers remorse, though i would be instantly psyched if i can this stuff to work.

 

[pne]

funny i was thinking you should try voodoo, then you mentioned black art, i read this thread hoping there would be some info on here for me. I just started trying to put fluid in my new system today all day long i've had an open reservoir full of fluid connected to a brembo lever with it's bleeder valve open and braided steel lines with calipers with open bleed valves and hoses attached, nothin,, tommorrow i clean out my fork fluid syringe and try pulling fluid by vacuum from the calipers bleed lines. I'll take any lever feel though firm is prefered ,all my experience is with prefilled bicycle hydrolics,hayes and hope tech.Monday i call spires were i bought my perhaps a bit outdated brembo(non folding) lever and brakel lines/pads at pretty much top dollar, right now i got a bit of buyers remorse, though i would be instantly psyched if i can this stuff to work.

I've never been able to get a gravity bleed a bike before. Starting a new dry system is always the toughest. What you need to do is get the nipple loose, just finger tight. Then you need to pump up the lever and open the nipple with your fingers. You need a lot of pumps to build up air pressure in the line, before cracking the banjo each time. When you crack it, you should give it a few seconds and also wiggle the nipple and wait for the air to come out. The reason you use your fingers is because you have to crack that nipple open a ton of times before the fluid will even start to flow, so its much faster than using a wrench.

 

[RedRaptor22]

I always gravity bleed my brakes, just pull the top off the res and crack the valves just enough so that they drain at at fast drip. Keep adding fluid to the resevoir for a few minutes "DONT LET IT GET EMPTY!". After a few minutes or three or four fill-ups tighten the bleeders back down.

I've always had good luck this way despite it being messy and wasteful, the idea is that the bubbles travel upwards into the resevoir naturally instead of trying to force them downwards where they tend to get trapped in the system.

 

[pne]

whenever I try that, some fluid drains out of the caliper body but doesn't pull down more fluid from the lines, and I get a huge air bubble.

 

[RedRaptor22]

whenever I try that, some fluid drains out of the caliper body but doesn't pull down more fluid from the lines, and I get a huge air bubble.

Have you tried tieing up the brake lever? sometimes that helps to make the fluid flow through the mc better.