Bleeding brakes!

Brakes

There was a weep where the copper pipe/brass union joined the central (rear brakes) master cylinder. There may not have been much of a weep, but with brakes you don't mess around. To inspect this I had to drain the brake fluid from the reservoir and pipes above the rear master cylinder - messy! Here I attached a plastic tube to the nipples of both rear callipers (separately). I then opened each nipple to drain the fluid from the pipes, as if bleeding the brakes, and the reservoir. The Eezibleed system was used to put some pressure in to the reservoir and pipes to flush out the brake fluid.

Once this was done, the rubber pipe that feeds the reservoir and the copper brake pipe were removed and inspected. I could see a small score on the copper brake pipe flare. Then I noticed two cracks in the brass union. No wonder it was leaking! I had probably tightened it too much to cure the weep from the flare in the copper pipe. Unfortunately I don't have a spare union or section of brake pipe to make another. I cleaned the master cylinder union hole with a cotton wool bud dipped in acetone, to get rid of any oil, then conceded defeat.

So I need to speak to Andy on Monday morning and ask him to fit a new union and pipe when the car comes down for checking over. As a result the handbrake cannot be finalised, so another job for Andy.

Polishing

Because I couldn't do any more work on the brakes, I turned my attention to cleaning the car. After vacuuming it out, I used Simonize carnauba wax on the body. Not the easiest stuff to put on and take off, but a great shine. Managed half the car before I got bored. Will do the rest tomorrow.