Babalouie's 911 - start on p7

[Babalouie]

how does it go down there?
tazz was drivng me home after the drifiting at EC.

Bumpy as hell but the 911 rides high, so no probs. Doesn't quite squirt between the corners with the same violence as the Datto tho

[the buttonman]

i thought as much...
its such a good road and has many sweet corners, but its completely ruined by the fucked surface.

oh and arseclowns driving down it at 40km/h the whole time...

[Babalouie]

Both the Hako and 911 are ok on it tho, but you prolly don't want to be any lower.

[Babalouie]

Couple of new things arrived from my (now weekly) package from Pelican

The Motive Pressure bleeder


...and some new oem wheelnuts


911 wheelnuts are alloy, so they're nice and light like the fancy japanese aftermarket wheelnuts, but rather oddly the anodising seems to flake off with corrosion eventually


So it's a little unsightly.


My friendly local Porsche dealer quoted me $30 EACH for new wheelnuts, but as always Pelican comes to the rescue, and these were $US8ea.


You might have noticed that one of the old wheelnuts has a weird hole in the middle of it, and that's because of these oem locknuts. Quite nifty, you flip off this plastic cover and then use a key to pull off this cylindrical cover. However after 20yrs they're a bit wonky and I've had a few episodes where the key's just pulled out of the lock and the cylinder had gotten stuck. So into the bin they go, to be replaced by a regular wheelnut.


But...the thing I was most eager to do, is to finally bleed that ^&%%^$ clutch.


First you fill the power bleeder with brake fluid


You attach the Porsche-specific cap onto the reservoir, and then clamp the overflow line (why does the 911 have an overflow tube on the reservoir?)


Pump it to 10psi...


...attach a tube and bleed bag to the clutch slave, and just open the tap! Immediately fluid starts to flow out in a healthy stream. A few bubbles pop out, and after about 200ml has flowed through the system, I figured I was just about done when....BUBBLES!


There must have been quite an air lock in the middle of the system somewhere, as quite a lot of bubbles came out in succession, then the fluid went clear again. Now, I've bled this thing backwards, forwards and sideways in the past week, so I'll be damned if I know where they were hiding, but well...it seems that there was still air in the line.

After about 350ml was passed through the system with no more bubbles, I called it a day.


But the power bleeder still had a lot of fluid in it, so I thought I'd bleed the brakes while I was at it. All you do, is attach a tube and open the bleed nipple and let the old fluid flow out.


The power bleeder was great to use and good bang for the buck at US$50 (plus shipping). It has a fair bit of capacity, so I only had to pump it up 3 times for bleeding all 4 brakes and the clutch (about 750ml of fluid passed in all).

When you're using it, it pumps fluid into the reservoir, which becomes full. But when you're down to bleeding the last corner, you tip the power bleeder on its side, so that its feed tube inside is exposed. At that point it pumps air instead of fluid into the reservoir, and you just bleed the last corner until the fluid level in the reservoir goes down to the correct level.

It's so easy to use! I'm a big fan of Speedbleeders (and I have them in every car) but this is a much better solution. And I'm impressed that it managed to get some air out that my regular bleeding method didn't.

So...how is the clutch? Much better. The gearshift I would say is smoother than it's ever been since I've had the car, and is quite acceptable. Not as light a japanese gearchange and is a bit "chunky", but is a big improvement on what it was before. Not quite a knife through butter...more like a crowbar through cheese, but I think that's sorta how it's meant to be,

....but it's still not quite right. There's a certain inconsistency about it which tells me there's still something possibly wrong. Anyway...after changing the master, the slave, the softline and bleeding the living bejeezus out of it...I think there is just one more place to look. I'll check it out tomorrow....

[VE Safari]

Great thread Babs.

FWIW I made a powerbleeder a couple of years ago using a garden weed pressure pump sprayer. Wrote it up for another forum, will find it and post.

[Boxer]

Nice,

- that looks like the single best solution I've seen and wished I'd known about it before doing mine

If only it had an adaptor for the Brembo reservoir on the motorbike - that is another bastard to bleed cleanly

[irsa76]

Yeah I love powerbleeders. Always get good pedals with them. I like how yours comes with disposal bags for the old fluid, great for the home mechanic rather then trying to figure out what to do with it. Which reminds me, found an open 2 year old bottle of brake fluid in the shed, had to be the good Penrite DOT4 as well.

[Babalouie]

I like how yours comes with disposal bags for the old fluid

Actually the bleedbag and hose are from www.speedbleeder.com Pretty good stuff, the hose and bag last for years and the hose never pops off the bleed nipple.

Great thread Babs.

FWIW I made a powerbleeder a couple of years ago using a garden weed pressure pump sprayer. Wrote it up for another forum, will find it and post.

Yeah Takai posted some details in another thread about his home made one, but when I saw that the Motive one was only US$50 (and I was ordering stuff from Pelican anyway) getting one seemed a good idea. You can order a universal one that comes with several different reservoir caps to suit japanese cars too....I shoulda got that kit instead of being a cheapskate

[peal]

So where are you looking next? The clutch or the gearbox itself or could it be the actual linkages from gear stick to gearbox? (I imagine they are rather complex).

[Babalouie]

So where are you looking next? The clutch or the gearbox itself or could it be the actual linkages from gear stick to gearbox? (I imagine they are rather complex).

Yes...well I spose that makes it 2 things...

The linkages are like the pedals in that Porsche used 500 parts where one would do, and so there are lots of bushes to check. I think that's probably not it tho, since apparently you get lots of vertical play in the gearstick as an initial symptom.

The possibly more likely thing, is at the clutch pedal. The pedal is floor-hinged, and at the bottom is a jackshaft. At the other end of the jackshaft is a bellcrank/ The bellcrank pushes a pushrod into the clutch master, and the bellcrank and jackshaft aren't splined or keyed together (which would be nice) but instead are staked together with a rollpin that goes thru a hole in the bellcrank and the jackshaft. So the brunt of the rotational stress is borne by this rollpin.

I wouldn't be too surprised if the rollpin is cracked and collapsing, or say the hole in the jackshaft is flogged out and ovalised. The clutch pedal itself has a very strong return spring, so it's hard to feel if there is any undue slack.

[peal]

duh, forgot the clutch pedal.

[Babalouie]

Bloody Porka...you know I changed the clutch slave in the Hako on the weekend...took all of 10 minutes, including bleeding (which was mostly done by gravity)

[Q]

....I shoulda got that kit instead of being a cheapskate

*chuckles*

[Babalouie]

*chuckles*

And now it's gonna cost $50 in shipping to get the $25 parts to make my kit universal.




....unless of course I am getting more parts from Pelican, in which case the postage is free (well sort of). Hmmm...what to get for next week's order...

[Q]

Bloody Porka...you know I changed the clutch slave in the Hako on the weekend...took all of 10 minutes, including bleeding (which was mostly done by gravity)

thought you would have worked out that everything works backwards by now :p