Brake Bleeding

Psymonkee

Psymonkee

Psymonkee

Soldato
Joined
24 Feb 2004
Posts
14,378
Location
St.Andrews
Hey,

Was about to go for a ride last week and found the brakes had no stopping power at all on my Kona Cinder Cone (2008 model I think?) so I got a brake bleed kit.

Had a go at it earlier on and lots of air and old fluid came out of the lines at the brake lever end and the lever became firm again. Tidied everything up and took it for a quick spin.

Almost immediately the back brake had no pressure in the lever and the front brake barely worked. By the time I got back home (~50-100m) the front brake pretty much didn't work at all.

Used the correct fluid and what not but can't figure out what I've done wrong - any pointers? :)
 
What brakes are they?
I do it in this order (cos I have crappy avid/sram brakes)
Get Air out of the fluid in syringe
Bleed Caliper
Bleed Lever
**prod the plunger on the lever syringe before I remove it to pressurise the system
Profit.

Did you put some pressure back into the system before removing syringe? I get about 5 pulls out of the lever before it comes back to the bar and I have no brakes if I forget that step.
 
May have missed that last step. First time doing this myself so all a bit new. Got enough fluid to have another go though!

The brakes are Hayes Sole iirc. Been a long time since I rode my bike at all!
 
I've yet to attempt this (first set of hydra discs only a month old!).

Any 'tricks' of the trade? (Shimano 785's)

Or just a case of buy the bleed kit and figure it out from GCN videos? ;)
 
Shimano brakes seem to be a lot easier to bleed than Sram ones. Also you'll be wanting Mineral Oil, rather than nasty dot 5.1 or whatever.

You shouldn't need to bleed them for at least 6 months, or longer... when they basically are about to stop working altogether. (imho).

Just get the best bleed kit you want to spend money on and follow a tutorial on youtube :)
Epicbleedsolutions seem to have good stuff.
 
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