Today on the Brakes

I knew the brakes weren't working when I bought the car; I mentioned previously that the level sensors in the reservoirs were shot.  So today, I installed the two new reservoirs with sensors.  I had also cleaned, rust-treated and painted the bracket that holds the bottom reservoir, because it was badly corroded whenI removed it to get the old reservoir out.

Top Brake Reservoir (Front Brakes)

Bottom Brake Reservoir (Back Brakes)

Having refitted the reservoirs, I proceeded to bleed the brakes.  I used a low-cost kit that I had bought from Canadian Tire to allow me to bleed the brakes on my own.  It basically consists of a fitting for the bleed screw, a bottle and a length of plastic hose.  On top of the bottle is a fitting with a non-return valve.  The bottle also has a magnet fitting to allow me to mount the bottle where I could see it.  It worked well, as I was able to monitor the fluid going into the bottle from the drivers seat, while I was depressing the brake pedal.

Before starting, I removed each of the bleed screws to make sure they were clean and clear; all were OK.

I started with the two inboard back brakes.  Easy to get at, once the back seat was removed, both sides bled fine, with virtually no air coming out of either side.  The front brakes were a different matter altogether.  The left side I pumped for about 5 minutes (probably way too long when I think about it), but couldn't get rid of air through the plastic hose.  Same problem on the right side.

By the time I had finished trying to bleed the front brakes, I was out of time for the day, so I cleaned up, then decided to run the car for a short time before I left.  The car started fine, but it wasn't long before the garage was full of fumes - guess that was just confirmation that there's a leak from somewhere in the brake hydraulic circuit, and the leak is near a surface that gets hot when the engine is running.

Some of the smoke from the leaking brake fluid - this was after 2 days.
Same day was much worse.

Don't know how long (or how much smoke) it will take to burn off all the brake fluid, but I'll try to find the leak before running the car again.  Probably going to need a bit of help with this one!!