Bleeding Brakes

julielou2 · Post by **julielou2** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 11:19 am

I've had my red 1992 480 Turbo since June 2001 and apart from a new starter motor, alternator, suspension thingies and exhaust (:x), she hasn't behaved too badly or cost too much for a reasonable amount of fun.

However, she failed her MOT 3 weeks ago, mainly on all 4 brake discs (and pads) being worn out and 2 seized rear calipers. Due to me baulking at an estimated Â£700 ish cost at the garage, my fiance has been very clever and replaced the faulty bits with Volvo parts (which cost Â£421.00) but for nearly the last 2 weeks, he's been unable to get the stupid rear brakes bled enough to stop the brake being spongy when I press it.

We bought a Haynes manual and he spoke to our local Volvo dealership but although there were no air bubbles coming out of the bleeding tube and the brakes seemed firm enough when the left hand side rear was bled but this was only until he tighted the nut thing on the rear right hand brake or as soon as I started the engine. Once either of these things happened, the brakes went all spongy again. Fiance says that the master cylinder is OK and that he seems to have fixed the brakes situation now, but I'd love to know why bleeding 480 rear brakes is so hit and miss, even if you're following all the instructions. We were following instructions in bleeding the rear left brake, then the right hand one, so why was the right hand one making the brakes spongy but not the lhs? (Apparently the front brakes are fine and don't need bleeding.)

(Just to make matters worse, after having to wait for Volvo to send out 17mm tapered bolts to replace the one which needed cutting out of the old caliper a couple of weeks ago, another bolt head sheared off the front wheel in one of the holes that holds the brake disc to the car. Ordered 2 new ones from Volvo which turned up yesterday but the bolts are actually the wrong size

- will I never drive my car again?

)

Reading through these forums trying to find hard brake bleeding advice, I've also seen a post about the turbo's cambelt needing replacing. I've never had mine done - do I need to or can I wait until it breaks? Feeling rather scared that I'm going to have to pay out even more money on the old bag.

Any advice on bleeding and cambelt please?

PS Apologies for non mechanically phrased, girl question.

rpruen · Post by **rpruen** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 11:33 am

julielou2 wrote:
Reading through these forums trying to find hard brake bleeding advice, I've also seen a post about the turbo's cambelt needing replacing. I've never had mine done - do I need to or can I wait until it breaks? Feeling rather scared that I'm going to have to pay out even more money on the old bag.

Any advice on bleeding and cambelt please?

PS Apologies for non mechanically phrased, girl question.

Most important: Don't wait for the cambelt to break! If it does chances are that your engine will stop with a sickening crunch, and that will be the end of it. Get it changed ASAP (it's not that hard, the manual you have has instructions).

As far as brakes go, make sure that you bleed all of them. Somtimes air bubbles get into the system and move along the pipes. The other thing to check is that there are no leaks anywhere. It's easy to forget to do up a fitting, and that will let air in to the system. Sometimes a leak is hard to find, as under pressure it seals, but when you let go it leaks. If you have too many problems then a local garage won't charge too much to bleed brakes.

Hope that helps

Richard

julielou2 · Post by **julielou2** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 12:16 pm

Thank you Richard.

Is every 3 years (about 30,000 miles) about right for cambelt changes then?

Ben Harris · Post by **Ben Harris** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 1:07 pm

It says to change it every 60,000 miles (and possibly 5 years - can't remember if that bit's there or not) in my Owners manual for my 480. Although mine is a non-turbo, so it might be slightly different for yours.

When you change it, it's probably worth changing the tensioners (there are two of them) whilst you're at it, as if they sieze at a later date (as one did on mine), you'll have to take it all apart again! Check out some of the online places such as:

Euro Car Parts
GSF Car Parts
Buy Parts Buy

for some cheaper spares. I bought my tensions from Euro Car Parts for about Â£20 each, as opposed to the Â£90 that Volvo wanted! (although I did buy a genuine Volvo cam-belt).

Ben.

chris1roll · Post by **chris1roll** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 3:25 pm

the earlier 480's said 40,000 miles for a cambelt change... Do it now!!!!

personally i don't think i'm even going to let it go that long, i'll have mine done every 30, to have it done properly costs Â£70, peanuts compared to teh hassle of putting a new engine in if it breaks or you do it yourself wrong (I let the garage do it)

as for bleeding the brakes... great, i had to disconnect three of the lines from the master cylinder as part of my engine swap, so its a full drain and flush for me... hope it isn't as much of a pain in the arse as you say!

welcome to the club BTW

rpruen · Post by **rpruen** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 3:33 pm

julielou2 wrote:Thank you Richard.

Is every 3 years (about 30,000 miles) about right for cambelt changes then?

No problem.

50k is the interval volvo specify. Actualy 45k to 60k depending on year. If you get a new belt it will be the newer type, but I would change it at 50k anyway.

Richard

lee · Post by **lee** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 4:16 pm

cam belt is very important. Change it every 3 years or 36,000. This is what i use as a safe change.

The brakes its not as bad as it appears in the book of lies. I done mine only last week.

New disks and pads all round and fluid change cost me Â£100. I do believe this to be cheap. I replaced the fluid with dot 5 as its better.

JohnTurbo · Post by **JohnTurbo** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 11:31 pm

The reason i was given my 480 was that it needed new disks pads (front and back) and brake lines. I got the pads, discs and fluid for 100ish, and a brake line kit for 40. Volvo had told the owners to scrap it because it need this, and would be about Â£900 to sort..

Anyway, i bled my brakes as per the HBOL, and i thought they were spongy too, so rebled them, and again, then changed the fluid totally. The same. So when Gaz had a drive i asked him and he said they were pretty normal, and i've driven 2 480s since, and they were just the same.

My point is, are you comparing it to how it was before, or other cars?..because the brakes on my ibiza were great for feel, and the 480 is a bit poor, although they do stop well, so i thought there was a problem when there wasn't.

Wecome, by the way!

julielou2 · Post by **julielou2** » Sun Jul 11, 2004 2:29 pm

Thanks guys. Getting the cambelt and tensioners done will be the next job after it hopefully passes it's MOT retest this coming week. Just got to get a numberplate as I'm always cracking it going into bolards with the nose being so low. Female spatial awareness you see!

Regarding the brakes, my fiance is going to take it out to give them a test but won't let me come with him in case he crashes!

I've tried the brake and it does feel very spongy but I can't even remember how it should feel now as it's been over 3 weeks since I've driven the old cow. Will book it in for it's MOT tomorrow and hopefully if they aren't safe it'll be picked up on and I'll just get the garage to put it right.

Lee, you got an exceptionally good deal on the parts. Fiance wanted me to have original Volvo brake parts, probably the brakes and the tyres are the most important bits to spend the money on as they keep me in one piece when I'm having a bit of a blast in it.

Thank you for the welcome.

Jules

Joolz · Post by **Joolz** » Sun Jul 11, 2004 6:39 pm

julielou2 wrote: Just got to get a numberplate as I'm always cracking it going into bolards with the nose being so low. Female spatial awareness you see!

omg girl dont admit to anything..........

cheers

jimforrest · Post by **jimforrest** » Sun Jul 11, 2004 10:15 pm

I had trouble bleeding my 480 SE brakes after a cylinder change on the rear. The answer is easy - just tell the garage to bleed the brakes then MOT it. A few years ago garages used to use a power-bleeder which did them in a couple of minutes. Mine cost Â£20 on the MOT bill.

JohnTurbo · Post by **JohnTurbo** » Sun Jul 11, 2004 11:37 pm

Yes its a good technique, i had an old car with dodgy emissions, I payed them to sort it, and i'm pretty sure they just gave up, and tested the emissions of the air just behind the car...or of another car. I didn't care, i just wanted an mot so i could sell the bugger.

chris1roll · Post by **chris1roll** » Sun Jul 11, 2004 11:39 pm

did you bleed tehm inthe right order, fo a non ABS car that is, left hand rear, right hand front, right hand rear, left hand front.
Just done flushed mine, the fluid that cam out was almost black

we replaced it with castrol performace dot 4.

Is it ok to use dot 5.1 lee? I thought about it, but decided to stick with what i knew would be ok.

On an ABS car, you bleed the rear ones using the ABS which runs at 180 BAR. That is somewhere in the region of 2600 psi I think. I would strongly recommend letting a garage do that!!

JohnTurbo · Post by **JohnTurbo** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 5:42 pm

Chris/anyone...have you actually sucessfully done the abs method for rear brakes? Didn't do anything on mine, so i used the mechanical method, which worked fine.
Wonder if its another piece of fiction from the HBOL.

Murf · Post by **Murf** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 7:14 pm

i got a couple of rear brake pipes changed for the MOT a couple of weeks ago and when i asked the mechanic told me that you open the bleed nipples and depress the brake pedal once and the fluid just comes spurting out until you close them! has to be done with the engine on though, obviously so the ABS is working!!!

chris1roll · Post by **chris1roll** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 7:56 pm

i won't touch it, 2600 psi would make a hole right through you if you fuck it up. I don't have gayBS on mine anyway, so i don't need to worry.

Murf · Post by **Murf** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 8:22 pm

I don't have gayBS on mine anyway, so i don't need to worry.

i used to think that too, but it has saved my scrawny little ass on a number of ocasions since i got my turbo and now i wouldnt be without it!

are you upgrading the non vented discs to vented discs now you've got a turbo engine or do you reckon grooved solid discs will do the job?

chris1roll · Post by **chris1roll** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 8:33 pm

The earlier turbo's didn't have vented discs, at least mothers doesn't, an my donor car hasn't. i think my grooved ones are doing the job fine.

I'm not necessarily travelling ang faster, just that i got there quicker

Murf · Post by **Murf** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 9:26 pm

I'm not necessarily travelling ang faster, just that i got there quicker

ho ho, took me a bit to figure that one out!!!

chris1roll · Post by **chris1roll** » Mon Jul 12, 2004 9:42 pm

well its like:

you don't need a fast car to drive too fast,

you don't need to be driving too fast to be speeding,

and conversely

you don't need to be speeding to be driving dangerously

4 1/2 years with reasoning like that and i haven't had an accident yet (touch wood)

Volvo 480 Club Europe

Bleeding Brakes

Bleeding Brakes

Re: Bleeding Brakes