I finished installing the Willwood brake hardware on my car today. Not having any of the friends around, I asked my wife to man the brake pedal for bleeding. I gave her the usual pump and hold commands and was disheartened to find than very little fluid was coming through to the caliper. After a few tries I figured that something must be wrong upstairs at the master cylinder. I could hear her pumping the pedal but no results. Since it was a conversion which included the American master cylinder with the adapter, I figured that it could be the rod wasn't getting enough throw. I disassembeled the unit and although it looked OK, I gave it a little more length and put it all together. Unfortunately we repeated the bleeding process and got the same bad results. I again took apart the Master cylinder assembly and decided to check the amount of throw of the brake rod. I asked my wife to press the brake pedal in and to my shock, the rod didn't move at all. Since the assembly is pretty much a solid link, I started having visions of some broken pedal linkage piece. I asked my wife to keep pumping the pedal so I could try to find tha problem. Then it hit me, the sound was not coming from the brake but from the clutch cylinder. My wife who does not know a thing about a maunal shift system had been pushing the clutch pedal the entire time!
Well, I'm now well versed in the removal and installation of the master cylinder. I think I'll buy one of those one man bleeder systems!
Original Post