BrianB

Okay so I started this wonderful project yesterday. I decided to change all the brake pads and rotors on my 99 Trans Am. I also decided to go ahead and paint the calipers since they were off. So here is what my quesitons are.

1.) I read on installuniversity that if you disconnect the brake line from the caliper, you want to seal it with the bolt and a nut or your in for a bad day. Well, I didn't do this because I wasn't aware. I just removed the brake line from the caliper and that was that. Took the bolt out of the line completely. Why is this bad first off? It says that it will drain your master cylinder, but when I removed them, more fluid came out of the caliper than the line.

2.) Got everything put back together the way I believe it should be, and I don't have any brake pressure at all now. Now I found that I pretty much exhausted all of my brake fluid because I must be missing one of the washers for the brake line to where it connects to the caliper. Any idea where I can find a replacement one of these? They look like a copper washer, called a crush seal I believe. Could this be the root of my problem and explain why I
have no brake pressure because the fluid is just squirting all over the place?? Stupid question I know, but I wanted to ask.

3.) Final question, my drivers side rear brake, the emergency brake band (looks like a drum brake) came off while trying to remove the rotor, I put it back on the way it looked on the oppopsite side, however, now my brake light is on with the lever in its regular position. Any ideas on this one?

I am getting ready for the trans am nationals this weekend, and need to get this fixed. All advice is appreciated, and thanks in adavance.

sills1

iTrader: (1)

Did you bleed your brakes after you reattached the brake line to your caliper?

When you are painting your calipers, it is always a good idea to do one one caliper at a time. You can remove all at one time, but if you are a novice, one at a time is easier to handle. Remove the brake line, remove the caliper and do what you want (paint or whatever) then replace the brake caliper and reattach the brake line. At this point, you need to bleed the brakes (remove the air from the brake line). Do a search for bleeding brakes, I don't have the time to type it out for you. Make SURE YOU KEEP THE RESEVOIR FULL OF BRAKE FLUID. If you run out of fluid, air will be in every brake line on your car and you'll have ONE HELL OF A TIME comparitively speaking to doing one brake line. I hope that helps you. Sounds to me like you didn't bleed the brake after you replaced the line.

The reason you want to plug the hole on the caliper with a bolt is to keep dirt or any other contaminant out of your caliper. Dirt will clog up your brake system. Paint isn't a good thing to have floating around in a brake system either.

blackws6ta

iTrader: (1)

SILLS - just sent you a PM. now to the problem. if you didnt put both crush gaskets back on the banjo bolt, then the bolt and hose wont seal to the caliper. you need to have one gasket on the bolt by the head and aonther on the bottom of the line touching the caliper. what you want to do then is bleed the brakes. if you pump the pedal slowly and you dont get any resistance what you need to do is start at the point farthest away from the master cylinder. IE: your passenger rear caliper. have someone open the bleeder while you slowly push the pedal down. when more fluid than air comes out stop at that wheel and close the bleeder and move to the opposite side, repeat there and then move to the pass front repeat there and then the drivers front, all the while you need to make sure that your master does not go dry. after that part is done, you should have a good pedal, but not as good as you previously had. what you need to do now is slowly pump the brakes till the pedal gets hard. start in the same sequence as before with the RR then the LR then the RF then the LF. while your holding pressure on the pedal have someone open the bleeder. your foot should drop to the floor, when it does close that bleeder and repeat until only fluid comes out. do that at all four corners while keeping the master full. after you are done, top the brake fluid off and your good to go. the brake light is probably on due to the fact that everytime you push your brake pedal you are losing fluid, and the level in the master dropped low enough to turn the light on. hope this helped. say Hi to the guys at the ws6store.com tent at the nationals since i cant make it there. have fun

Mike