good morning PF, here's my problem;

I have a mk4 escort estate that has had RS turbo calipers put onto it. Recently I fitted braided brake lines and since then, the brakes just basically haven't worked! I have pressure-bled and manually bled them numerous times, so has two professional garages. The master cylinder has been changed twice and still no results. When I fitted the lines, I pushed all the fluid out of the system and put new fluid in.

The brakes worked fine before I fitted the braided lines. There are no leaks, no pistons have popped out but the pedel travels much to far and with no proper feel to the brakes. The second garage I used said that only half the system (N/S/F and O/S/R brakes) is working but this may just be a result of a primary problem.

Could I need a bigger master cylinder? If so, what could I use (sierra 2.0L master cylinder etc?).

Please help anyone! the car is undrivable at the moment

 

you need to get the air out AND use a bigger master clyinder AND servo from the rs

you'll probably need the larger rear brakes too as they will be pushing more fluid through the rear lines so you may end up locking the rears

 

Thanks Dojj,

What i dont understand is that before I fitted the lines, the brakes were fine. All i did was drain all the fluid, fit the braided lines and bleed them. multiple times and so did two garages. Im gutted.

the master cylinder I originallly fitted was working fine when i had it on another escort. Then i swapped them back and this has made no difference.

I have the larger RST rear drums already and the master cylinder is from an RST as well. not sure on the servo but if it worked fine before, it should work with the braided lines.Surely?

 

This is a difficult one , as you have stated you only replaced the hoses with braided items , this should not alter anything other than a slightly better feel to pedal but you have fone backwards .

have you tried "Step Bleeding" , messy but can help to track the cause of this , disconnect each hose in turn and bleed into that see , if you get any through , then using 4 pipe joiners and bleed nipple see if you can pressure the system , I have a few ideas but simply put it sounds as if you just have masses of air in the system or the pressure bleeding has caused the master cylinder to fail as i know this has happened if someone depresses the brake pedal with the pressure on as you get reverse pressure on the seals and this can cause them to fail .

 

thanks for the advice. more things to think about replacing and trying!