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Old 05-11-2005, 10:05 AM   #1
Yukon Jack
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Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Rose Hill, KS, USA
Posts: 12,683
Homemade brake pressure bleeder

A while back I saw a post somewhere on making your own pressure bleeder for brake and hydraulic clutchs. Since I do most of my work on my truck alone I figured this was worth looking into.

Here are two links that I saw in the past that detail how to make the pressure bleeder.

http://www.arkansaspontiacs.org/tec...der%20story.htm

http://www.bmw-m.net/TechProc/bleeder.htm

It is very easy and cost me very little. I had an old garden sprayer that had a broken wand so I got it cleaned up and used it for the sprayer. Then all that is needed is a piece of metal to secure to the brake reservoir and a barbed ended metal fitting that I attached to the metal plate after tapping the hole. I put a piece of rubber on the metal plate to aid sealing against the reservoir. For a hydraulic clutch I assume you would want to buy an extra cap and drill it for the fitting.

I put a small tube in the fitting like on of the links recommended so some of the fluid would siphon out of the reservoir so it wouldn't be over filled when you are ready to pull the metal plate off the reservoir.

I also added a pressure gauge as the links mention you don't want more than 20 psi. I had an old gauge so I just drilled a hole in the tank and screwed in the gauge. No leaks even without sealing it up.

I would recommend putting something under the reservoir as I did have a little leaking each time until I got the metal plate tightened down enough. I used c-clamps to secure the plate to the reservoir.

This tool works like a charm. The only drawback that I found was that when initially getting fluid to flow I was adding a bit of air to the reservoir so I ended up flushing all the old fluid then the air and then the new fluid. That was fine for me since I was intending to get rid of all the old fluid and that made it easy to see when I was into the new fluid.
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Last edited by Yukon Jack; 05-11-2005 at 10:09 AM.
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