No ground??

[alex.foo]

Hey how's it going. I got another issue that I should get help on. Well plain and simple my s14 misfires randomly and very rarely while driving. And in other cases when I turn off the car, everything completely shuts off in the car as if disconnected from the battery, except for my auxilary fans. I'll wait like 3 min. and powers back on in the car. I suspect both these issues are related right? Like a ground huh?

[brndck]

Yeahhhhhhh start by making sure your battery terminals are clean and tight, and that all your grounds are clean and properly installed. Report back.

[alex.foo]

roger that, its been checked got new ground cable with new battery and a clean ground to the frame.

[mr.nismo.]

Sooo did it fix it?

[alex.foo]

Yes i believe so. I HAVE YET ANOTHER ISSUE!!! I bled all the lines good and proper. But when I started my car the brake pedal sank. Ill pump the brake pedal while the cars on and it doesn't harden. Even with the engine off the pedal doesn't stiffen?? Man oh man :(

[alex.foo]

And as we were bleeding the brakes the booster was acting fine. Vaccum leak?

[Mikester]

Doesn't sound like a vacuum leak if the pedal sinks to the floor with the engine off... This sounds more like the MC needs to be rebuilt or there is a leak in the system... If you're not losing fluid, then the MC is prolly bad.

Hopefully you bled LR, RR, LF, RF per the FSM. If you didn't, it could be as simple as air got slurped into the system when you started the car.

[alex.foo]

Oh no. I did RR LF RF LF. Alright I'm going to check for leaks of any kind hopefully that's it.

[Mikester]

Whenever you bleed brakes, you start with the farthest spot from the MC (not physical distance, but length of piping) and work your way to the closest... On a 240, it's LR, RR, RF, LF=)

[mr.nismo.]

What mikester said

[alex.foo]

Shoot ok ill try that tonight. Thanks

[alex.foo]

QUICK UPDATE: I have a suspicion. While bleeding the brakes the hand brake was on....

[racepar1]

Whenever you bleed brakes, you start with the farthest spot from the MC (not physical distance, but length of piping) and work your way to the closest... On a 240, it's LR, RR, RF, LF=)

Realistically it's not really important what sequence you bleed in, ESPECIALLY on a non-ABS system. I know what the books tell you, but I've bled all kinds of brake systems in all kinds of sequences without issues. I still try to follow the proper sequence, just to be thorough, but I don't put much thought into it anymore.


OP: If you had air in the system the pedal would still pump-up and not sink, it would just be low unless you pump it. A sinking pedal is a classic sign of a bad master cylinder. I wouldn't spend much time bleeding it before I condemned it.

[Mikester]

Realistically it's not really important what sequence you bleed in, ESPECIALLY on a non-ABS system. I know what the books tell you, but I've bled all kinds of brake systems in all kinds of sequences without issues. I still try to follow the proper sequence, just to be thorough, but I don't put much thought into it anymore.


OP: If you had air in the system the pedal would still pump-up and not sink, it would just be low unless you pump it. A sinking pedal is a classic sign of a bad master cylinder. I wouldn't spend much time bleeding it before I condemned it.

:faint:

Well shit lol- As usual, what you say makes perfect sense; and you have the experience to boot...

FSM aside- I bet from a mechanic's perspective, you'd still agree that working from the farthest to closest plumbing points is probably the best way for us non-mechanical types to tackle it... If anything, so we don't end up possibly chasing our tails, yea? ;)

OP, by all means listen to racepar1- your MC may very well have crapped out... However, if your rear brakes are stock, bleeding with the parking brake on may be the issue because the pistons need to be free to compress/decompress with pedal movement... but like he said, don't waste too much time on it... If you can't get pressure & have verified no leaks anywhere; replace or rebuild the MC.

A new MC is cheap, and a MC rebuild kit is even cheaper. If you replace or rebuild the MC, purge all the old fluid out best you can and replace it with fresh stuff. Since you'd be starting basically from scratch, this would be the optimum time to do so. Also, if you end up having to do it, make sure & bench-bleed the MC fairly well... Not 100% necessary I've found; but a time-saver in the long run. You can do it with the MC installed using the brake pedal to push the piston.

My $1M question is: what were you doing that drove the need to bleed your brakes in the first place? Maybe knowing this could help shed light on the problem.

[alex.foo]

Well I deleted my abs. And got all the components for non abs. And I forgot to take the e brake off...darn.
So if the MC does need rebuilding, I do not need to remove it? Cool well hoepfully all it needs is some proper bleeding.

[alex.foo]

The pedal doesn't necessarily sink on its own. In other words, when I pressed on the pedal, the brakes wouldn't grab till it was like 100% press down. But even then it was barely grabbing. Last night I spent a good hour bleeding them making sure for no bubbles thats why this seems very odd to me.

[racepar1]

The pedal doesn't necessarily sink on its own. In other words, when I pressed on the pedal, the brakes wouldn't grab till it was like 100% press down. But even then it was barely grabbing. Last night I spent a good hour bleeding them making sure for no bubbles thats why this seems very odd to me.

If you spent that much time bleeding it and you still can't get the pedal up, it's probably the master. You shouldn't have a large amount of air in the system, even bleeding with the e-brake on. You SHOULD be able to pump the pedal up if the master is good. It sounds like it won't pump up at all, and since you got it from a car that some dude was parting out, it's VERY likely bad.

[alex.foo]

Damn it I think you're right racepar1. My brakes are sticking now:( and the brakes over heated because I had to drive it back home from the gas station even though I relieved some of the pressure. I bled them earlier tonight and the pedal was stiff and all but my brakes were STICKING:( What would cause that!?!?! :(

[Mikester]

^^pads (rear) on backwards. I accidentally did this on my 180SX back in the day...

If you're talking about the fronts, the only thing I can think of is a piston binding up(?)

So now they work, but they stick? Damn- you got some shitty luck dude :)

[alex.foo]

Yea sucks. But what about adjusting the brake pedal. I looked at the locking scre for tnhe brake pedal and its adjusted all the way out. Can that make this problem?

[alex.foo]

That's not it. FML. I was doing a little bit or research and I found a couple of potential culprits. But idk what to condemn. This is the symptom; As I drive off the brake pedal gets super hard and the front calipers stick. HELP!!!!!

[racepar1]

It is possible for a bad master cylinder to cause the brakes to stick. You didn't change the calipers, rubber hoses, or booster when you deleted the ABS did you? I have seen a booster cause the front brakes to drag on a toyota truck before, but if you didn't change it I wouldn't worry about that. It sounds like you got yourself a crusty old POS master to me...

Also, DO NOT ADJUST THE BRAKE PEDAL OR THE PUSH ROD ON THE BOOSTER EVER!!! If you screw with that stuff and you're not 100% sure what you're doing it'll cause problems very similar to what you've got.

[alex.foo]

Btw thank you racepar for the help. I would like to retract my previous post.
Now is it possible to fix my problem by adjusting the brake height?
Because I think I did just that. Last night when I test drove it my pedal had no play at all.
I realized the brake light wasn't even coming on yet and I was already braking. Till they finally lock up on their own at the gas station and it wouldn't budge. How do you check for a bad MC/Booster?

[mechanicalmoron]

Realistically it's not really important what sequence you bleed in, ESPECIALLY on a non-ABS system. I know what the books tell you, but I've bled all kinds of brake systems in all kinds of sequences without issues. I still try to follow the proper sequence, just to be thorough, but I don't put much thought into it anymore.


OP: If you had air in the system the pedal would still pump-up and not sink, it would just be low unless you pump it. A sinking pedal is a classic sign of a bad master cylinder. I wouldn't spend much time bleeding it before I condemned it.

If you have a bad or very leaky caliper, that line (and maybe the one it's paired with) will empty, but hopefully, it won't empty out past the preportioning valve or anything, and the pedal will sink a long way, but then very suddenly hit a stiff spot and work on the other brakes.

Maybe when he bled them, a bleeder got left too loose, or was tightened after the pedal came up, or something like that.