dwm83

Hi all,

I hope you may be able to give me some pointers about installing new hydraulic brakes on my bike. I've installed brakes before when the parts have all been dry and then need to be bled through once installed. However, my new parts have arrived with the hose connected to the calliper pre-filled (but NOT yet connected to the levers, so it's not a totally pre-bled unit, the levers are 'dry'). I've never encountered this before, the user guide is pretty unclear how to tackle this and I can't find any forum posts or videos dealing with this situation.

Do I need to add more oil to fill the reservoir in the levers once I've connected them up to the hoses, or is the oil in the hose sufficient? The levers are Shimano Deore BR-T6000 and the callipers are Shimano Deore BR-M6000.

Have tried searching for any videos dealing with this but can't find any, so any pointers there would be helpful too.

Many thanks for any suggestions you have!

David

vespasianus

In those cases, I have honestly just done a "quick" bleed. That is, cut the hose to length, attached the barb and olive, install into the lever and tighten to spec. Then I attach the bleed cup to the lever (can rotate the lever so level) and add a little bit of oil to the cup. I subsequently "push" oil up from the caliper side and that forces the air out of the hose and fills the lever with oil and gets all the air out. I do a couple of push/pulls to make sure everything is OK and there is no air in the system before I remove the syringe from the caliper and with the bleed block still in and the bleed cup still attached to the lever, doing flicks with the lever and lifting the bike up and down to get ride of any air bubbles. The whole thing should not take more than 10 minutes.

dwm83

That’s really helpful. Makes total sense too.

Many thanks!

Iride01 

User manual are mainly for those that already have them installed and don't DIY their own stuff. The DM's (Dealer Manuals) give more info, though you do have to know a little since they are just showing what to do and not concerned with why.

https://si.shimano.com/pdfs/dm/DM-TRBR001-02-ENG.pdf

https://si.shimano.com/pdfs/dm/DM-MBBR001-04-ENG.pdf

https://si.shimano.com/#/

cpach

So official Shimano recommendation is definitely to do a normal bleed proceedure, pushing fluid up from the caliper into the resevoir. Doing so isn't a terrible idea, but a quick (legit) trick is that you can advance the pistons somewhat before cutting the hose, then cut and reattach the hose. From there attach the bleed funnel with some mineral oil, and reset the pistons and you will force the extra oil out which will push the small air bubble you created at the cut into the resevoir, which you can then normally top bleed. The primary time saved is from not having to remove the pads and clean up the caliper.