jkelley

• I picked up 2 quarts of some good DOT 4 brake fluid on Saturday and then went straight home to change my clutch fluid.
• Everything went smoothly but I noticed a LOT of bubbles in the bleeding tube down into my fluid catcher.
• I kept topping off and topping off the fluid and just let it keep going.... after going through BOTH bottles of brake fluid I was still seeing a significant amount of bubbles coming down the line.
• Just before running out of my brake fluid stock (end of the 2nd bottle) i slowly pumped the clutch 2 times to see if that did anything... nope. Still the same amount of bubbles. So I pulled the clutch all the way up, let it bleed some more to fill any air pockets from that, topped off the reservoir with the last of my brake fluid and capped the bleeder.

Is this to be expected? I thought there wasn't supposed to be any bubbles?

I haven't had any clutch issues or anything, I just did this as routine maintenance.

As a side note, the previous owner had just had the master cylinder changed out (at least I think that's what it was, I'll have to verify that).

J Schmidt

No idea how to help you now but I think I read a Billman that said don't bleed the clutch because its a pain in the ass to get the air out. I think it was recommended that one empties the rez, clean it out best you can and then change out the rez fluid continually until it is clean, like after each drive for a week.

starchland

Gravity bleed the clutch when it's warm.

Are you sure your not opening the bleeder too much and it's sucking air through the threads looking like its coming
From the line?

Bottom line, how does the pedal feel?

sillyboybmxer

Billmans method ftw

jkelley

The pedal feels totally fine. It's normal to have like 1" of pedal loose pedal movement before it hits the spring, right? No issues shifting or anything though, seems strong.

The car was not warm when I bled it, and I could have had the bleeder valve open too far now that I think about it and it it was doing just that. But The air pockets were definitely moving downstream to the bottle only. None ever went up. Each bubble was separated by a pocket of fluid down the whole line.

I will definitely use billmans method from now on, that sounds like a great way to go.

But, now that I have some potential air I pulled in, how do i get it out? lol
I guess I would just have to open the bleeder valve a little less this time and bleed warm?

INDYMAC

I've heard that if you hold the slave bleeder valve in the up position, it helps get the air out when you open it. I believe Billman said that awhile back.

starchland

Yes just crack it enough to see a drip, doesn't take much like 1/4 turn... sure this is your problem