More rear brake woes.....bleeding

[Citizen]

Hi All,

MOT time and I thought it would be a good time to change the pads on the rear brakes on my curvy as it was an advisory last year and though it would be a "simple" job.........

Now 1 week later I have, after having to drive the pins out with a nail punch to find the pistons seized then stripping the rear caliper down to clean and clear it is finally back on..........however.

Bleeding the brakes is an issue, I have got to the point where fluid come out of the bleed valve happily but the foot lever is still flimsy and I`m out of ideas and loosing the will.

Any advice ladies and gents will be much appreciated.

Cheers in advance

[Bibio]

remember there are two bleed nipples.

This may sound bizAre to some right but it works for me every time, take the bleed screw out completely and cover the hole with you thumb and just keep pumping the pedal and you will feel the pressure build up release your thump and you will feel and hear air come out probably with some fluid to, keep doing this until just fluid is coming out, and then pop the bleed screw back in and bleed from there as normal,

I know this maybe seems bizzare to some and not the way it should be done right but I was like this the other day with my brothers bike and I was about pulling my hair out and it was simply because of loads of micro air bubbles in the system I was at it for 2 hours and then just lost the head and tried this and honestly once I felt that pressure in the pedal I was relieved,

Give it a blast anyway what else you got to loose, ps if this doesn't work the air could all be trapped in the line so same procedure but disconnect the line of the calliper and then reconnect when you see fluid running out


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[Red Herring]

Most problems bleeding rear brakes stem from the fact that the bleed nipple on the caliper is pretty much at the same level, or lower, than the master cylinder. Air in the system tends to settle at the highest point and this can be the top of the master cylinder, so basically every time you try and push it down towards the caliper and bleed nipple it works it's way back whilst you are on the return stroke. To avoid this either remove the caliper and hold it up near the pillion seat so that the brake line it always rising after leaving the top of the master cylinder (remember to put an old pad or similar between the pads otherwise you will pump the pistons out to far) and bleed it conventionally, or crack off the banjo at the top of the master cylinder and reverse fill the line with a syringe full of fluid from the bleed nipple until it comes out of the loose banjo.

[Craig380]

The thing that works for me is: don't open the bleed nipple too much, just a little. You should still feel resistance at the pedal / lever. Also, don't open the nipple unless you've got pressure on the pedal / lever, and close the nipple just before the end of the stroke.

[Citizen]

Cheers gents, I have opted for the "do nothing until tomorrow" approach and hope the air will rise out overnight!

Will have a look again tomorrow.

You may be having the problem I had with my SV1000

Mine was front brakes but applies to rear too

Basically after applying pressure my pads would push to the disc but then retract too far leaving the lever feeling spongy

Solution is simple though, to find out if this is your problem release the caliper and wiggle it and see how tight your pads rest to the disc, if it's really loose you have this problem

Fix is simple, pull calliper away from disc and apply light pressure and make the pads close slightly so that when you put the caliper back on the disc there is slight friction

This solves the problem and gives you your feel back

Don't do this too much though or brakes will drag, lift the wheel and test it still rotates freely after doing this

Did this on front and rear brakes and never had such nice firm brakes (but then again I do use carbon lorraine pads and have a radial gsxr master on front)

[Bibio]

depends on how spongy the brake feels. remember that pads need time to settle in so there will be a bit of sponyness.

[Blapper]

I found my SV brakes hard to bleed too. I bought a vacuum bleed kit which did the trick, leaving me only a few conventional pumps at the end. On other bikes, I have used a huge syringe to fill them from the bottom up, then a couple of conventional pumps at the end. That was the best way - from completely new and dry cylinders and hoses to rock hard brakes in 15 minutes.

[Citizen]

All sorted, the old motocross technique of weighting the foot lever and leaving it for 24 hours and it is solid as a rock

Cheers for the replies all