Picked up some new SRAM E1 levers and calipers, and after some truly stupid hose routing issues I’ve finally got everything connected, but after bleeding the levers are pulling to the bars. When I do the last step of the bleed - close the caliper off, flick the lever and pull the lever syringe, the lever feels great, nice and firm. When I remove the syringe, quite a lot of fluid comes out before I get the chance to close the port with the torx bolt.
Just wondering if I’m doing something wrong, or if I have to do something special at the end. I don’t think there is any air in the system, but I could be wrong.
Not sure if I’m missing something here, but after you’ve pulled the lever syringe, did you push the syringe’s plunger a little, to equalise the negative pressure in the brake lever body?
When you pull on the syringe, what you’re doing is extracting residual air in the lever body, causing this same air to float up and into the syringe body. Without pushing (slightly) on the syringe plunger and replacing the air with fluid, you’ve actually created a vacuum in the lever body. This has the effect of causing the fluid in the lever body to be expelled, when the syringe is removed, as the air pressure at the interface equalises.
This sounds like what I did wrong. I’ve yet to fix the long lever throw, but interestingly, last night I had my bike laying on its side over night after doing some tyre/tube repairs. Both front and rear brakes felt amazing this morning on the ride, with far less lever throw.
I’ll still re-bleed them soon, but found the accidental improvement interesting. I don’t expect it to last.
In a recent build, I followed this video EXACTLY for my Force E1 brake bleed following hose shortening (supplemented by the manual and SRAM’s own videos for additional reference) and it went perfectly. I recommend doing a follow along if you can: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lToa5fzLjqc I had never done any installation or maintenance of hydraulic brakes before. I even used his other video for bleeding current gen Shimano 105/Ultegra/DA to help a friend a few days later–I’m the new team mechanic!
I was following the video, and it looks like the non-bleeding edge steps are different and you push from the caliper. Following this did the trick! Thanks
I’m glad that worked out for you! The reason SRAM provided for pulling and pushing the plunger at the lever instead of caliper for bleeding edge is to prevent the syringe from becoming detached from the caliper. I believe the remaining steps are largely the same. I suspect it’s the fact that you did one more bleed that got rid of more air in the system, rather than pulling and pushing the plunger at the caliper.
I recently saw a video somewhere on YouTube with a slightly modified, super simple way to bleed AXS brakes. Start with a mostly full syringe at the caliper and one 1/4 full at the lever. Push just about all of the fluid up from the caliper. Then push it back and forth a few times, ending with a push from the caliper side. Close off the bleeding edge port on the caliper, remove the lever syringe and cap it. Done. Don’t even touch the lever. With this method, I’ve been able to bleed the brakes in less than five mintues and the brakes feel great.
Doing this from the caliper with bleeding edge goes against SRAM’s recommendation:
“Do not push brake fluid into the caliper with the caliper syringe. Excessive fluid pressure can cause the Bleeding Edge syringe tool to dislodge from the caliper. Use the lever syringe to move fluid through the system.”
Bleeding edge at both ends would be a bad idea…that would let you actively pressurize the system. If you’re getting a ton of fluid leaking out, you can do the final step (push in and let it equalize) and then pull the plunger out just a bit more before you close off the syringe and remove it.