Brake Bleeding? The Answer?
 

I know there are many threads about brake bleeding but I am still not exactly sure how to do it on my yea 4Runner. Here is a few quick questions.

I know there is an ORDER in which it should be done but do not know this order including the LSPV?

I also wonder if the truck must be off the ground to bleed the brakes?

Also, should there be fluid in the hose before you brake the nut to bleed em or should the hose end just be sumburged in fluid?

These are a few quick questions but my story goes like this. One day my lines or LSPV broke and fluid leaked everywhere in my driveway so I took it to the shop and they did just the lines and Valve without readjusting the brakes. When I got it back the brake pedal went STRAIGHT TO THE FLOOR but evenutally stopped the car at the bottom. The guy told me to readjust them and it should work fine. This made no sense to me because they worked before and were set to the right height then but I did it anyways. This did very little and felt like the pedal may have caught like 1/2 inch higher. So this is where I am now and I hope I just have to bleed the brakes but wouldnt' the shop have done this? Maybe they messed up doing it and this is all I have to do but I have also heard of an adjusting screw inside the master cylinder that fixed this problem for another member. If anyone could give me advise it would be grately appreciated.

Thanks,
Alex

Hi Alex, I guess the first thing to check would be for leaks when you step on the pedal. If there’s a leak somewhere, you can bleed it all day and it still won't stop. Have someone keep pressure on the pedal and check all the fittings, hoses, T's, master cylinder, calipers, rear wheel cylinders and LSPV. Also buy brake clean and clean up the rotors, drums, pads and shoes real good. Oily brakes don't work real well.

If there's no obvious leaks go get a big can of brake fluid and start with the wheel closest to the MC. Use a tube, have someone pump the brakes up and hold them, then crack the bleeder, let out the air or oil and once the pedal hits the floor, close it back up. It’s not necessary to pre-fill the tube with oil but just keep checking the MC to keep it full. Work your way to passenger side front the passenger side rear, and lastly the driver side rear. Bleed each wheel 5 times or so making sure that before moving on to the next wheel, you don’t get any air coming out. Maybe go around once more bleeding each like twice just to make sure that all the air is out.

Remember keep the MC full, the more old fluid you bleed out the more new stuff that the system has in it and that’s good. Also, if you see a surface film on the fluid in the MC you may want to get a turkey baster and empty this out and refill it with new before you start. Water in the brake lines is not good. If you still have no pedal then its not air in the lines, its a leak somewhere or a faulty master cylinder.
Good luck.

Thanks for the advise benman. I am almost positive that there are no leaks in the system but will check anyways. For now I will assume there is no problem there.
Some of the tips on bleeding are very helpful and thank you.

One questoin though. Most resources I have read from say that you are supossed to go from the farthest brake from the master cylinder to closest. You say the opposite to that?

I understand that you keep fluid in the master cylinder so it doesnt just start sucking in air (defeating purpose of bleeding).

I forgot to mention that I have an 87 4Runner so was wondering the order for that. (the Master cylinder is on the driver's side of the car but the brake lines run down the passangers side to the Load Sensing Proporioning Valve)

Thanks again,
Alex

I'm trying to think if it would make a difference which direction you travel. I've always done it closest to farthest and have never had any problems. However I guess farthest to closest would work just fine. The key is just going slow, making sure that you have all the air out of the line your're working before moving on.

I guess before you start with the brake bleeding, try pumping the pedal up firm and holding it. If you can pump it up and it holds, then try bleeding first. If it does not stay firm but sinks as you hold pressure on it, then diligently look for leaks. This also could indicate a bad master cylinder.

I'll try to find out too if there is something bad about working closest to farthest brake.

http://www.autosite.com/garage/encyclop/ency14p.asp

Here's a good article that includes vague instructions for bleeding a master cylinder too, if the shop replaced it and didn't bench bleed it before installing it, this could be your problem.

I always go furthest to closest, which on the 4runner is both rear, LF and RF, and then the LSPV. With the rear both are the same distance because one line splits at the axle. Bleeding the LSPV last is important, the first time I did mine I missed it and found I had almost no brakes. It's possible the shop missed yours so maybe bleed there first and see if that helps.

That is exactly what they did, missed the LSPV!!!! and it worked perfectly after I did that!!!!!!! - And I did that last

They charged me like $730 for 2 long brake lines and the LSPV installed. I think this is way too much especially cause i had to do all thsi work after.
What do yo uthink about this price???

Thanks for all the help,
Alex

Seems like a lot of money, if that's all they did. Brake lines are cheap, and not that hard to replace. Maybe the LSPV costs a lot. How much did they charge for parts.

Tell me, I've never replaced my LSPV, and therefore have never bled it. What is the procedure for doing this?

Previous owner replaces all the brake lines and the invoice is was for $1500. :shocked: :shocked:

He kept all the inoices for the work that was done and let me tell ya, STEALERSHIP describes them to a T.

LSPV costs like $230 from dealership, and its a toyota part.

So i guess that is a decient price, but since i had to do all the work after it seemed so unreasonable.

And bleeding the LSPV is easy, just do the same as you would for the brakes, but do the valve last.

Hi, sorry to bring back a dead thread but this is the closest I could find to my question.

I was doing a brake fluid flush/fill on my 2000 SR5 yesterday and got a little bit of air in the lines. So I was bleeding the whole system. Got all the air out of the lines and went to look for the load sensor valve but couldn't find it. My haynes manual said it easily found mounted to the frame rail, but I didn't see anything on my truck that looked like the picture in the book. The only place I couldn't see was where the line for rear brakes runs behind the gas tank.

Can someone give me a point please?

it should be attatched from the rear axle to the sensor in some fashion so that the up-down motion of the axle changes the position of the sensor (and in turn changes the rear brake bias), on my 2nd gen it was a steel rod. check your rear axle over carefully and you should be able to find it.

If you have 4 wheel abs, you don't have one.

I wish I had check the thread before I crawled around under the truck getting all dirty and still not finding it. :)

4 wheel abs...LSPV not there...got it.

Thanks! :)