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Re: brake fluid (2)

To: SamuelsMA@aol.com, 6pack@autox.team.net
Subject: Re: brake fluid (2)
From: acekraut11@aol.com
Date: Sat, 02 Sep 2006 20:12:02 -0400
 Michael,
 
 As Shawn pointed out, a C clamp works well. Years ago when I owned an early 
Honda Accord with a brake caliper piston that sometimes liked to stick I could 
pull over, remove the caliper, use the C clamp to push the piston back from 
where it was stuck and put everything back together in under 10 minutes, even 
with a very hot wheel, rotor,etc. I was too poor to buy a caliper for a couple 
weeks.
 
 As for the other question, my uneducated guess would be that they are not the 
separated so that a failure with the front or rear lines will still leave you 
the opposite brakes working.
 
 Aaron
    Aaron Cropley
 71 TR6 (Throttle Body Injection!)
 http://www.triumphowners.com/108
 Topsham, Maine   
 -----Original Message-----
 From: SamuelsMA@aol.com
 To: 6pack@autox.team.net
 Sent: Sat, 2 Sep 2006 7:06 PM
 Subject: brake fluid (2)
 
  Listers:
 
I posted some questions a few days ago about changing my brake fluid.   
Thanks to all for your responses.  The process was very similar to changing  
the 

fluid on my Porsche, which is required before every track event, so it was  
familiar to me.  
 
The project did throw me one curve ball, however, and perhaps someone could  
give me some insight.  I was bleeding the right rear wheel cylinder, and  all 
of this ugly old fluid (looked like dilute pea soup!) was coming out.   Then, 
I started getting air bubbles and the pedal lost resistance, as if the  
reservoir had run dry.  But the reservoir was still full of ugly old brake  
fluid.  
Then I noticed there there was a small front reservoir compartment  that did 
not appear to communicate with the larger rear compartment.  I  deduced that 
this section is dedicated to the rear brakes, while the larger rear  section is 
for the front brakes.  So I filled the rear section with fresh  fluid and had 
my son pump until the bubbles were gone and the new fluid came  through.  We 
did the same with the left rear wheel, but I checked  frequently to make sure 
that the small front reservoir never emptied out  fully.  Then we did the right 
front and left front wheels, which took quite  a while to clear out the pea 
soup.  By the end, there was clear fluid  (Castrol) coming out of both front 
calipers and the brake pedal felt fine.
 
My question is:  Is the small front reservoir section supposed to  
communicate with the larger rear section, but mine is plugged?  Or are the  
sections 
supposed to be separate?  If they are supposed to be separate,  why?  On my 
Porsche and on my son's Jetta, there is just one compartment  for both front 
and 

rear.
 
A second question:  I put in new Green Stuff pads today.  I  retracted the 
pistons by opening the bleed valve and using Vice Grips.   Worked fine, but the 
teeth on the Vice Grips look like they could really damage  the caliper seals. 
 They didn't, but there must be a better method.   Ideas?
 
Thanks as always.
 
Michael
'76 Tahiti Blue
CF 57044U


   
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