The 2000 Pontiac Grand Am had to have brake fluid added and now i thin that the breaks need to be bled. How do you do it on this car? it used to be a pain in the Sonya Heine to do it on my old Volkswagon, but I hope that it is easier to it on the Grand Am. Please make my day and tell me that it is easy.
Thanks
Sorry for the mispellings, I am tyring unsuccessfully to multitask
I certainly hope you don’t multitask while bleeding your BRAKES .
If you have to ask then it’s better to have the bleeding done by professionals. Botching a job that involves your braking system is just asking for trouble.
To bleed the brakes on this vehicle requires either a factory scanner or a diaphram type brake bleeder.
http://www.branick.com/products-brake-bleeder.php
With the scanner, the brakes can be bled by using the brake pedal. Without a scanner, the brake pedal cannot be depressed to be bleed the brakes. But must be pressure bled using the brake bleeder.
Tester
When you filler the master cylinder was there still some fluid in it? If so you don’t need to bleed as there would not be any air in it.
Simply adding fluid to a reservoir that already has some does not introduce air into the brake lines,
Why did you add fluid? Do you have a leak? Did you replace any brake components? Why do you believe bleeding is needed? I want to be sure we have the whole story here.
As the brake pads wear, the fluid level will drop in the master cylinder bottle. If what you did was top that fluid off due to brake pad wear, there’s usually no need to bleed the system. So before proceeding make sure you ask your shop if you actually need to bleed the brakes.
@Tester;
Because this is a 15 year old car…I’m just wondering about not being able to bleed these brakes.
I’ve never heard of this though I’ve done hundreds of brake jobs in the last 5 years and never ran across this. Though many of those brake jobs…the hydraulic system was never opened…so no bleeding may have been done, even if I was working on one of these types of systems.
Sorry for my ignorance, but I hase no idea how this would work…or why.
So my question is, was this something that only was used on a few years models, or is this something still being installed on new cars.
Is this system common and I’ve just been lucky enough to miss out on working on them.
I’d hate to replace a caliper for someone and then find I can’t bleed the system.
And what can I look for to indicate that the vehicle has this type of system.
Yosemite
I agree @GeorgeSanJose, that’s what came to mind, but it sounds like the pedal will not depress to try bleeding.
I would presume that there is a sensor that reads the pressure in the hydraulics and with low pressure it locks up the pedal. But that would be an accident waiting to happen if you ever had a leaky line etc. That cannot be.
I’d just like to know a little more before I work on one of these and then have to get the car towed to a dealer to bleed the brakes after I’ve replaced a line or caliper. I’d be eating that bill.
I’m just a little shop and only work on cars part time so I want to be informed and keep myself out of trouble.
Yosemite
Because on this ABS system, when bleeding the brakes you need to hold the valves in their HOME position in the ABS pump.
You can do this with a scanner that can command the valves to go to their HOME position, and then bleed the brakes with the pedal.
Or you turn the ignition on for at least ten seconds to make sure the ABS pump puts the valves in their HOME positions, and then use the brake bleeder to bleed the brakes.
If you try to bleed them the normal way, you’ll end up with a mushy brake pedal, and then you’ll need the scanner to reset the valves back into their HOME positions.
Tester