Brake fluid flush w/full synthetic. Better braking & stiffer pedal

[WHITEOUT]

So, I don't know about everyone else. But my brakes always felt spongie! I have cross drilled & slotted rotors w/ceramic pads, and my brakes work very well, but the pedal always felt spongie, soft at times especially after getting heated up, good but not as stiff all the time as I would like it. Mind you, it's an 01' so the fluid is 9 years old, so decided to fully flush all lines with synthetic fluid.
I did it Sat. by myself with one of those, self bleeders, that you can use by yourself, took me about 1 1/2 hours to fully bleed/flush all four calipers. I used a total of 2-32oz of Castrol GTLMA Synthetic brake fluid Pretty much just bleed/flushed each line until I was done with both bottles. Took awhile, but the bleeder I used had a small bottleto catch fluid, I've seen bigger ones, but just bought the cheap one from local auto parts store.

After 2 days of use, it is a huge improvement!! Brakes feel much stiffer, and even after full warm up, and long drives heating up the fluid and brakes in general, the pedal always feels just as stiff first drive till end, never a spongie feeling, softness that my Tahoe with old fluid. Don't know if anybody else has this problem, but my pedal feel sucked. Just letting everyone know the much improvement in feel after doing full flush to synthetic fluid. Don't know if anyone wants to do,but man, my brakes feel extremely better the before with old brake fluid.

 

[Z-56 Hoe]

yes thank You for that imput.

 

[denalianyone]

yes my pedal is spongy too..Im going to add some goodridge ss brake lines and bleed the system.

 

[Rick]

sorry for off topic, but whiteout, dude are those real white walls or is it photo shopped? if they are real that is effin awesome!!!!!!!!

 

[Tahoeatl]

photoshop

i have a spongy feel right now. i'ma try what you did next weekend.
i just got a g35 infinity and its brakes are super stiff... havent felt my tahoe feel that way in a long time...

 

[WHITEOUT]

It's photoshopped!! But, got my whitewall tire paint coming this week to actually get it done!! Ya, I have been wanting to do it for awhile now, and saw a ride the other day with it done, so.... My tires will end up being whitewalled, just wanted to see how it looked, so posted a pic.

SS brake lines are a very good upgrade, i think especially for our big rides. But again, just letting everyone know how much of a improvement adding synthetic brake fluid helped my ride.

 

[Brooster]

thanks for the info, i have a 2001 hoe and i always thought my brake pedal felt spongy compared to other peoples tahoe's i have driven in the past, i will def try this to possibly cure then problem.

 

[WICKEDOWESIX]

Well I can almost bet that you had lots of moisture in you old brake fluid, since you said its been in there for 9 years, so changing it would make it feel 100X better and not so much because of the synthetic oil but just the fact that you had fresh oil in it without the moisture. I change my brake fluid once a year.

 

[lilsolo68]

are there any other ways of doing it, like pumping it up from the resevoir? i heard you can pump out your power steering fluid that way but dont know if the brake fluid can work the same.

 

[WHITEOUT]

are there any other ways of doing it, like pumping it up from the resevoir? i heard you can pump out your power steering fluid that way but dont know if the brake fluid can work the same.

Ya, you could probably get most of the fluid from the reservior out by syphoning it from there. But, you can only get so much before your gonna have to go to the calipers themselves and actual bleed them to get all fluid out of each line itself. So, yes, by syphoning fluid "as much as possible" from reservior, you will save yourself some time. But inevitably you will have to go to each caliper to get all fluid out of each line in the system.

And yes WICKEDOWESIX- just changing 9 year old fluid will help, but I bleed my brakes like you once a year, and my fluid was quite good, not black or burnt, and yes "maybe" there was some water vapor, minimul, in the lines. But the synthetic fluid alone stands up to higher rating operating tempertures, Higher boiling point compared to conventional fluid and thus will not brake down, or vapor lock as quick as conventional fluid. So yes, just changing/flushing your brake fluid out of lines will drastically help, but "I" am very impressed with this synthetic fluid and how it is staying consistent threwout the day under heavy, hot, driving conditions.

Just letting everyone know how much better my brakes feel after doing this brake flush, and how well the synthetic fluid feels. IMO I wouldn't go back to conventional brake fluid, just like my OIL, I use synthetic and will never go back to conventional.