Brake Bleeding Help!

[lucky phil]

So on this topic. Every ABS system I've encountered does a self test every time the car is started and driven, same with my bikes. It runs the ABS module pump and cycles the control valves and therefore in my estimation would transfer a small amount of fluid into the normal brake system each time. So in effect you are continually flushing the ABS module in normal use. I can see it would only be a small volume but 20 starts and ABS cycles a week would add up. I can see the requirement for ABS flushing/bleeding with the software if it gets air in the module or you fit a new module but as far as I can extrapolate the system should be self flushing anyway. 'Thoughts anyone or definitive answers?

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[razorlab]

So on this topic. Every ABS system I've encountered does a self test every time the car is started and driven, same with my bikes. It runs the ABS module pump and cycles the control valves and therefore in my estimation would transfer a small amount of fluid into the normal brake system each time. So in effect you are continually flushing the ABS module in normal use. I can see it would only be a small volume but 20 starts and ABS cycles a week would add up. I can see the requirement for ABS flushing/bleeding with the software if it gets air in the module or you fit a new module but as far as I can extrapolate the system should be self flushing anyway. 'Thoughts anyone or definitive answers?

I agree here. Unless you ran the res dry, most normal bleeding will work.

 

[theQuaybee]

Did it do the trick for ya?

It did. I'm not 100% sure it was necessary even in my case, but at least I know for sure we're good now. Like I had mentioned, I swapped to stainless lines and the pedal was going 80% to the floor before engaging the brakes, which I've never had happen before using my power bleeder on any of my cars, so I freaked out a little bit. I didn't feel comfortable driving it at all, let alone trying to engage ABS out on the road by stomping the brakes. After doing another bleed right before starting the ISTA procedure, I saw a ton of bubbles come out finally, so honestly that probably took care of most of it. But I still went through the procedure for good measure.

All that said, like everyone has mentioned several times, it's highly unlikely you actually need to do the procedure unless you really messed up and ran the reservoir dry, I just wasn't sure if something funky happened when I replaced my lines. I also want to do a bunch of updates so I wanted to learn how to get ISTA going.

 

[Thraxbert]

Recently swapped to a BBK and also needed ISTA to flush the ABS solenoids. Brakes were mushy crap without it. $70 license + power bleeder required. Pressurize power bleeder to ~15 PSI.

 

[gixxersixxerman]

My wife needed a laptop so i pulled out the laptop I bought just for ISTA and decided to try it out again just to make sure. Cost 7 euro ($7.26 at today's exchange rate) for the license then went right in. Screen shots are the charge on my apple card the March 20th and April 1st were 7 day license, the 2 for July were me adding the wrong item to cart the $4.37 was wrong and had to buy the 1 day license at $7.64. The receipt to show what I bought, 1 Day Diagnostics license. Screen shot from GTS showing my license (not sure why it says license expires in 2 days). Screen shot showing connected to my car and then screen shots showing me getting to the brake bleed process.

Not sure what Toyota ISTA the guy DL on my laptop but for me luckily its roughly $7 to perform my brake bleeding.

I did change the brake pads and bled the brakes on a friend's car and after bleeding even using the pressure bleeder the pedal went to the floor. I thought I was going to have to bleed the brakes with ISTA, but we tried it with the car running and that worked perfect. So, if anyone is having issues bleeding brakes and the car is off. Try doing it with the car running, because 4 cycles with a pressure bleeder and the pedal just sank. 1 cycle with car on and it worked great.

 

[theQuaybee]

That’s pretty interesting. The only difference is that you’re in Europe and on the .eu website. There wasn’t a one day option for me for one thing, the minimum is a 2 day “Professional Diagnostics” license which costs $70.

Hell even the “Standard” license cost $25 for 2 days, but that won’t get you into ISTA.

?

 

[razorlab]

That’s pretty interesting. The only difference is that you’re in Europe and on the .eu website. There wasn’t a one day option for me for one thing, the minimum is a 2 day “Professional Diagnostics” license which costs $70.

Hell even the “Standard” license cost $25 for 2 days, but that won’t get you into ISTA.

?

I did mine all through the EU site and I live in NY. I think the guy you quoted lives in Las Vegas.

 

[theQuaybee]

I did mine all through the EU site and I live in NY. I think the guy you quoted lives in Las Vegas.

Would’ve been great info a couple of weeks ago. The DIY link links to the NA site. Oh well!

 

[gixxersixxerman]

Yeah im In Vegas, I paid for a service of some guy in Africa from diag-tools and he worked on it over 15hours. I paid for the US TIS 70$ but that didn’t help us back then. Nothing he could do would get any of the US versions to work. Got a EU version and that worked. Idk what he did, or what he DL on that laptop,( I bought it and left it 100% free from my normal computer because I didn’t know if I could trust someone overseas on a PC that has my info and work/business info on it) But he was professional and everything worked in the end.

maybe someone that knows about this stuff can figure it out, but I have a bookmark to take me straight to the EU site, pay my 7 euro, then click on the GTS program log in after I pay my license, then click the ITSA program. All I’ve done really is the brake bleed, look at info on the car, I don’t wanna dick around and start something that may update my DME locking it and having to get it bench unlocked again or doing something else And bricking the car completely.

 

[FLtrackdays]

Yeah im In Vegas, I paid for a service of some guy in Africa from diag-tools and he worked on it over 15hours. I paid for the US TIS 70$ but that didn’t help us back then. Nothing he could do would get any of the US versions to work. Got a EU version and that worked. Idk what he did, or what he DL on that laptop,( I bought it and left it 100% free from my normal computer because I didn’t know if I could trust someone overseas on a PC that has my info and work/business info on it) But he was professional and everything worked in the end.

maybe someone that knows about this stuff can figure it out, but I have a bookmark to take me straight to the EU site, pay my 7 euro, then click on the GTS program log in after I pay my license, then click the ITSA program. All I’ve done really is the brake bleed, look at info on the car, I don’t wanna dick around and start something that may update my DME locking it and having to get it bench unlocked again or doing something else And bricking the car completely.

Do any of the larger software tool companies have access? Just curious if a local independent BMW mechanic could do it.

 

[gixxersixxerman]

Do any of the larger software tool companies have access? Just curious if a local independent BMW mechanic could do it.

I ordered a couple different ones that stated they could do Supra and Z4 but none would cycle the ABs module.

My brakes were perfectly fine until the powder coating. Here is where shit gets crazy. I put the freshly PC calipers on and had almost zero brakes, went through 300$ in Motul RBF trying to bleed them. Took them to a local friend that has a Euro shop as the tools I ordered wouldn’t work. He tried to bleed them no luck. He thought maybe I had a bad master cylinder so we swapped it with a friends car and was able to bleed his car fine and brakes are fine but could only manage to get say 50/60% of the proper brake feel. The car stopped but the pedal had a lot of travel. I even did a Supras in Vegas track day, the brakes worked but something was off. Afterwards took it to Toyota and they replaced the ABS module, got the car back and the brakes were even worse, they stated it had to be a caliper issue.

I picked up a take off set of calipers from a local that did a BBK, got the ITSA stuff here in March and did the bleeding with the newer set of calipers that I got from my friend. No difference then when I got the car back from the Euro shop. About 50-60% proper feel compared to a stock car. We put my PC calipers back on went through the procedure and was able to get it to about 85% or so feeling. There is slightly more travel then stock but way better then it has ever been. So new MC new ABs module and new calipers didn’t help me. 2 shops including Toyota couldn’t bleed my brakes.

My final observation was when doing my friends a couple weeks ago just a simple fluid change I had a huge amount of travel, 4 cycles and then decided to try with car on and that worked. At no time when I bled my brakes did I have my car running and the euro shop didn’t either, so next time I can pull out my quick jacks I’m going to try with the car running.

Anyways, that’s my long winded answer to a local BMW shop working on my car lol.

 

[Levophed]

Based off what I'm reading here it seems like you can cycle the ABS pump just by turning the car on & off and by triggering ABS.

I'm currently having this issue. I've triggered ABS maybe 10-15 times (purposefully) and started the car 30 -40 times since I started having a spongey brake....

Not sure if anyone can really answer this but is this enough to completely cycle the ABS pump of air? I'm ready to do another bleed but worried that there still may be residual air in the pump.

Want to try this one more time before trying the ISTA crap

 

[apatel471]

I got air in my ABS and did 3 rounds of bleeds and a bunch of hard stops to activate ABS and cycle out the air, no ista. It was so bad at the beginning that it would take almost 50 feet to stop from 20mph...

 

[Levophed]

I got air in my ABS and did 3 rounds of bleeds and a bunch of hard stops to activate ABS and cycle out the air, no ista. It was so bad at the beginning that it would take almost 50 feet to stop from 20mph...

Nice! Are you back to 100%?

 

[apatel471]

Nice! Are you back to 100%?

Yep 3 track days no issue

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