OK folks, here's my latest stumper:

My brakes don't feel like their starting to slow down my truck until the pedal is half way thru the stroke. Which would normally indicate air in the lines. But even if I pump up the brakes, the pedal doesn't get any stiffer. Which, to me, does not indicate air.

So what else could it be? I just flushed and bled my lines about a month ago....but I didn't know about this LSPV thing. What is that? Where is it? And could this create the condition I'm experiencing?

Also, my parking brake is completely ineffective. When I pull out the handle, the truck continues to roll. I have to figure out how to adjust it, but could that affect my pedal travel? The rear shoes looked OK when I inspected them. I'm assuming they self-adjust like every other drum set-up I've worked with....

thanks!

 

Its the rear brakes that gives you the 'stiffness' in the pedal, so that is the first place to look. The way yota brakes self adjust is when you pull your parking brake, unlike american cars that adjust when you are backing up. Make sure the rears are properly adjusted first.

 

You also get excessive pedal travel when the pads are worn out in front...

 

A combination of deep pedal and innefficient parking brake almost always points to rear shoes out of adjustment. Adjusting the rear brakes has been covered on here way too much for me to type it out again, so do a search on adjusting rear brakes. You can do it in about 10 minutes, with no special tools. You just need to jack up the rear of your truck.

I assume you don't have a mushy feeling in the pedal... it just goes down far before starting to brake? typically, Mushy = air or faulty MC, and deep but solid pedal = rears out of adjustment.

 

sounds exactly like my problem. i was stumped since day 1 that i've owned the truck (about 3 years) until about a month or so ago. i changed brakes, bled them many MANY times, changed calipers. . . .and nothing. turns out, the last time i was bleeding my brakes i had my wife help me. she's never done it before and didn't know that you didn't need to pump them 30-40 times between bleeds, but she was helping so i figured i'd let her keep her pride. anyways, the extreme amount of pumping showed me the leak. i have a leak in one of the rear lines directly above the gas tank. i never found it before because all the fluid that came out ended up on the top of the gas tank and as i drove it either blew off or evaporated, and this pumped enough fluid out of the leak to drip on the ground. long story short, i haven't fixed it yet, and about once every 2-3 months i have to add a few ounces of brake fluid.

as for the e-brake, i have 2 issues. 1. my cable is broke. and 2. the mechanism that engages the brakes mechanically is rusted solid. so no ebrake for me.

 

LSPV is bolted to the frame, located near the rear axle, which it's connected to via the bent/curved rod, you can't miss it. It doesn't sound like the LSPV to me, though, maybe? Anyway, checking is easy. Grab the rod near the top, closest to the valve housing. If you can feel any upward play; if you can push it up till it stops, it needs adjusted. You should only be able to move it down, it should be at rest as far up as it will go, without tension on the rod, well as slight as possible. Adjust at the point where it's bolted to the axle. Move it up to make it come in contact. This is all while the veh. is on a flat level surface.

 

if adjusting the rear brakes dont help go to the LSPV and bleed the lines to it closest to the master cylinder. these line will get air in them when doing brake work and bleeding from all the valves will not remove it. you will need to bleed them from the line fittings. then go back to all the wheel cylinders.

 

proportion valve.