Brake problems!!

[ElvisQuanbeck]

So here's my sich, when i was up in Milwaukee for Mama Tried the other weekend my rear brake pads fell out of my caliper. Fast forward to this week and I put it all back together in my garage in Chicago. I put in a new pad pin and plug since they were also gone. I've done a manual bleed of my brakes, it seems like there's no more air bubbles coming out, but even after retopping the rear master cylinder a couple times the rear brake pedal is still feeling spongy and the rear pistons don't seem to be pushing against the pads. I just ordered a brake bleed kit to make it a little easier on me doing it myself but I'm not entirely sure bleeding my brakes any further is actually going to solve my problem. I have an '04 Sportster 883xlc and I'm looking for any suggestions on what to do. I'm hoping it's not somehting in the linkage, especially since everything seemed to be working properly when I was bleeding them but I can't say that with certainty.

If you live in Chicago and want to swing by to lend a hand then I'm all for it. I'm going to say I have a decent amount of tools that I should be able to take care of the problem in my own garage with a little brain help at least.

[DazedandConfused]

When you say "put it all back together", what exactly is included in "all"?

Did you just disconnect the banjo fitting and remove the caliper, or did you go farther up the system? Also, does the bike have ABS?

[ElvisQuanbeck]

"put it all back together": I removed the caliper from my bike, disconnecting it at the banjo bolt and ziptiing the brake line as high up on my frame as possible so it wouldn't drip. One of the pad springs is housed in the bracket on the swing arm. I removed it for inspection, cleaned it with a rag and put it back in the bracket on the swing arm. The caliper was never taken apart, I pressed in the piston watching it spray brake fluid thru the banjo bolt that I had gently hand tightened and inspected the caliper as well as the second pad spring and it seemed ok. I then clipped the caliper pad spring back in, set the pads inside in the direction they should be, secured the pad pin and pad pin plug into the caliper to make sure everything fit as it should. I have a solid mag rear wheel so putting the caliper back on was a bit tricky as the caliper is located on my swing arm and I couldn't see where the inside pad was going at first. Once I removed my gloves and made sure the inside pad was placed in the bracket pad spring for the inside pad of the rotor, I then made sure the two bolts that secured the caliper to the bike were able to fit in position. Then I made sure the outside pad was secured in the swing arm bracket pad spring. At that point I secured the two bolts that hold the caliper to the swing arm and then attached the brake line and banjo bolt properly to my brake caliper.

At that point is when I commenced with the brake bleeding and such.

[farmall]

Every connection in that system can be used to bleed and air rises. I wrap a plastic trash bag around anything I want to protect from fluid then wrap that with a terrycloth towel (sacrifice one from the bathroom if needed, they're quite absorbent). Diapers also work well. Then you can use the banjo bolt or whatever to bleed too.

Sometimes bleeding then leaving 'em overnight firms things up.

[ExplodingCoffinEmporium]

So here's my sich, when i was up in Milwaukee for Mama Tried the other weekend my rear brake pads fell out of my caliper. Fast forward to this week and I put it all back together in my garage in Chicago. I put in a new pad pin and plug since they were also gone. I've done a manual bleed of my brakes, it seems like there's no more air bubbles coming out, but even after retopping the rear master cylinder a couple times the rear brake pedal is still feeling spongy and the rear pistons don't seem to be pushing against the pads. I just ordered a brake bleed kit to make it a little easier on me doing it myself but I'm not entirely sure bleeding my brakes any further is actually going to solve my problem. I have an '04 Sportster 883xlc and I'm looking for any suggestions on what to do. I'm hoping it's not somehting in the linkage, especially since everything seemed to be working properly when I was bleeding them but I can't say that with certainty.

If you live in Chicago and want to swing by to lend a hand then I'm all for it. I'm going to say I have a decent amount of tools that I should be able to take care of the problem in my own garage with a little brain help at least.

What kind of shape is your rear master cylinder in? I still have an 06’ XL and have rebuilt it and recall there being a factory design flaw with the rear master that could definitely cause the issues you described. I’m closer to the WI border not sure what part of Chicago your in?

My wife does have a heavy foot on this thing

[DazedandConfused]

To Farmall's comment about air rising, I've reverse bled stubborn spongy calipers before. Basically you fill your bleeder tool/syringe/enema bulb or whatever with brake fluid, and connect the bleeder hose to the bleed nipple on the caliper (be sure all air is out of the container and hose) and inject the fluid into the caliper to force any air up towards the master cylinder.

Another tactic that will sometimes work is to bound the lever in an engaged position and leave it sit for a day with pressure on it. That can often force little trapped air pockets out and firm up the lever (on the handlebars this is easy enough with zip ties or heavy rubber bands...you may have to get a little creative with a rear brake pedal)

[confab]

It's not always air.

If aggressive bleeding techniques doesn't fix it.. Sometimes when a brake component fails? It takes the MC seals with it.

The cups in a master cylinder run in a very narrow area during normal operation. You break something or you lose pressure, and you can cause the cups to leave their nicely polished safety zone and plunge into areas they normally wouldn't come into contact with.. Causing damage and soft pedal.

Fortunately, seal kits are cheap and easy to install. Fixes it right up.

[tomsoftail]

I bought a bleeder kit and it works well. A few of my wiser friends only go the syringe route. I’ve never seen it done.
The mighty-vac kit was $35….

[DazedandConfused]

It's not always air.

If aggressive bleeding techniques doesn't fix it.. Sometimes when a brake component fails? It takes the MC seals with it.

The cups in a master cylinder run in a very narrow area during normal operation. You break something or you lose pressure, and you can cause the cups to leave their nicely polished safety zone and plunge into areas they normally wouldn't come into contact with.. Causing damage and soft pedal.

Fortunately, seal kits are cheap and easy to install. Fixes it right up.

Agreed.

If the system is building and appears to hold pressure in the process, I default to assuming the seals in the M/C and caliper are ok, and try the "aggressive bleeding".

If that gives no joy, then I just figure at least one seal is gone somewhere, and because the rebuild kits are inexpensive, the rebuild is simple, and I have the system torn apart anyway, I just rebuild the caliper and the m/c both.

[confab]

Yeah.. And it's kinda nice to do anyway on older machines.

It really is amazing the trash you find trapped in there. Making your pistons drag and your brakes act weird occasionally, even though they technically "work" and really don't throw any big, red, flags.

[ElvisQuanbeck]

So here's how it stands after a month or so. Since I only have a 15 minute walk from my house to work, Chicago winter in my unheated garage fucking sucks, and I was travelling every other week these last 2 months, I was able to give a couple tries again. Since the traditional procedure of "manuallly" bleeding my brakes wasn't working I went ahead and ordered a "mighty vac" style brake bleeding kit to see if it would be any easier and something seemed off as I was trying it. Having bought it on amazon it didn't come with instructions of how to assemble or operate the kit so I watched a few youtube videos, read my manual, did some internet sleuthing and got everything put together and functioning as best as I could tell. As I was using the bleeder kit on the rear caliper, opening and closing the valve as I tried to pull the air bubbles, I realized after an hour or so that the champagne bubbles werent getting any better. I left it all connected over night and proceeded to try again the next day for an hour or so. Three days later I was still getting champagne bubbles coming out of the bleed valve for hours at that point.

So just before I ran off to enjoy the Mexican sun for a week or so last month I decided to order a syringe and some more fluid so I could go the reverse bleed route. I ziptied my syringe above the rear caliper, cut a short tube to go from the syringe to the bleeder valve on the caliper, placed the box wrench on the valve then ziptied the tube to the bleeder valve. I poured my brake fluid into my sryringe and let it seep all the way down the tube to the bleeder valve and let it sit for a few minutes to try and let any more air rise to the top using gravity before i put the plunger back into the syringe. I proceeded to open the bleeder valve about 1/3 turn and slowly pressed the plunger of the syringe while watching the fluid start to rise inside the reservoir before closing the bleeder valve again. Then I'd use a 2nd syringe to remove the old fluid from the reservoir before opening the valve and pressing the syringe plunger and cycling through this process about 4 times in total. I never saw any air bubbles coming out the reservoir with the old fluid so I'm assuming everything is hunky dory.

Now I'd really love to say this solved everything, and I'm leaning towards it did, but I can't say with certainty because I noticed one of my brake pads came loose and actually moved out of place while I was running my engine for the first time in a month. My rear wheel is a solid mag so installing the pads were a struggle when I started this whole project. What I'm gonna try and do tomorrow is remove my rear wheel, like I should have done in the beginning, just to make things easier on me so I can actually see whats going on with the pad and pad spring alignment in the caliper. When I pressed my brake lever it seemed like the piston was traveling properly, so I'm really hoping this solves all my brake problems. If it turns out that my brakes are still shit after all this, then I'm probs gonna end up cleaning and rebuilding the master cylinder and caliper. If that still doesn't work I'm just gonna set the whole damn thing on fire and steal my buddy's Dyna Low that's sitting untitled right next to my bike.

[docmel]

So here's how it stands after a month or so. Since I only have a 15 minute walk from my house to work, Chicago winter in my unheated garage fucking sucks, and I was travelling every other week these last 2 months, I was able to give a couple tries again. Since the traditional procedure of "manuallly" bleeding my brakes wasn't working I went ahead and ordered a "mighty vac" style brake bleeding kit to see if it would be any easier and something seemed off as I was trying it. Having bought it on amazon it didn't come with instructions of how to assemble or operate the kit so I watched a few youtube videos, read my manual, did some internet sleuthing and got everything put together and functioning as best as I could tell. As I was using the bleeder kit on the rear caliper, opening and closing the valve as I tried to pull the air bubbles, I realized after an hour or so that the champagne bubbles werent getting any better. I left it all connected over night and proceeded to try again the next day for an hour or so. Three days later I was still getting champagne bubbles coming out of the bleed valve for hours at that point.

So just before I ran off to enjoy the Mexican sun for a week or so last month I decided to order a syringe and some more fluid so I could go the reverse bleed route. I ziptied my syringe above the rear caliper, cut a short tube to go from the syringe to the bleeder valve on the caliper, placed the box wrench on the valve then ziptied the tube to the bleeder valve. I poured my brake fluid into my sryringe and let it seep all the way down the tube to the bleeder valve and let it sit for a few minutes to try and let any more air rise to the top using gravity before i put the plunger back into the syringe. I proceeded to open the bleeder valve about 1/3 turn and slowly pressed the plunger of the syringe while watching the fluid start to rise inside the reservoir before closing the bleeder valve again. Then I'd use a 2nd syringe to remove the old fluid from the reservoir before opening the valve and pressing the syringe plunger and cycling through this process about 4 times in total. I never saw any air bubbles coming out the reservoir with the old fluid so I'm assuming everything is hunky dory.

Now I'd really love to say this solved everything, and I'm leaning towards it did, but I can't say with certainty because I noticed one of my brake pads came loose and actually moved out of place while I was running my engine for the first time in a month. My rear wheel is a solid mag so installing the pads were a struggle when I started this whole project. What I'm gonna try and do tomorrow is remove my rear wheel, like I should have done in the beginning, just to make things easier on me so I can actually see whats going on with the pad and pad spring alignment in the caliper. When I pressed my brake lever it seemed like the piston was traveling properly, so I'm really hoping this solves all my brake problems. If it turns out that my brakes are still shit after all this, then I'm probs gonna end up cleaning and rebuilding the master cylinder and caliper. If that still doesn't work I'm just gonna set the whole damn thing on fire and steal my buddy's Dyna Low that's sitting untitled right next to my bike.

I haven't had any luck with mightyvac or any other manual pump bleeders: And it also seems like most bleeder screws are crap: Most when slightly loosened you can feel the bleeder screw has allot of play (You can actually wiggle them) and it lets air into the system, no matter how hard you pump: What has consistently worked with me is a bleeder that hooks up to an air line: Look on amazon, they run about $80.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B081GVKXLN/ref=nosim?tag=dealscanpg-20

The above has bled car, truck and MC lines, its super fast, and works when my mighty vac wouldnt: I tossed it and I only run the one I have now that runs off an air line:

[ExplodingCoffinEmporium]

Are you in Chicago proper or outside? If your north of the city I can come take a look/give ya a hand, if your west you could try conning DoomBuggy into helping ya out haha.

[ElvisQuanbeck]

Are you in Chicago proper or outside? If your north of the city I can come take a look/give ya a hand, if your west you could try conning DoomBuggy into helping ya out haha.

I'm the city proper, Humboldt park

[ElvisQuanbeck]

What kind of shape is your rear master cylinder in? I still have an 06’ XL and have rebuilt it and recall there being a factory design flaw with the rear master that could definitely cause the issues you described. I’m closer to the WI border not sure what part of Chicago your in?
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My wife does have a heavy foot on this thing

I'm in Humboldt park of Chicago proper. Got any links to rebuild kits you trust?