Trouble with car dolley surge brakes

[twinboat]

The only time you need to top off a master cylinder is if you bleed the brakes or you have a leak.

By design, the master cylinder holds more then enough fluid to wear your brakes completely out.

If you add fluid, with disk brakes, it will just spill back out when replacing the pads.

With drum brakes, the brake shoe springs, force the fluid to return, whenever the master cylinder is not activated. If it's low it's leaking.

[TROONORTH]

Hey Brockx she looks like a beauty! Mine is fire engine red with a black roof and that unbelievable 24 valve, double overhead cam V6. She just sings at 5-6000 RPM. I have had people argue with me that she is 'Italian' and one guy even said that I had just stuck the Oldsmobile tags on her as a joke!!

She spends her winters in New Smyrna Beach. Y'all come up and see us sometime!

[TROONORTH]

Good advice all! Thanks!

I am stumped about where the brake fluid has gone though. There was nothing behind the boots of the wheel cylinders. The shoes are almost new with lots of wear left in them. None of the connectors in the hydraulic lines show any kind of leakage and the actuator rod and connectors at the master are dry as a bone. There is some connection between the 'chucking' and the missing fluid and I am just not seeing it yet.

I am still leaning toward the 'aliens stole my break fluid' theory.

[ahicks]

It's a simple system. Put some brake fluid in it, bleed it, and keep an eye on it next time out. A debilitating leak should be obvious while bleeding. Anything smaller will likely be easy to identify.

[Brockx]

Originally Posted by TROONORTH

Good advice all! Thanks!

I am stumped about where the brake fluid has gone though. There was nothing behind the boots of the wheel cylinders. The shoes are almost new with lots of wear left in them. None of the connectors in the hydraulic lines show any kind of leakage and the actuator rod and connectors at the master are dry as a bone. There is some connection between the 'chucking' and the missing fluid and I am just not seeing it yet.

I am still leaning toward the 'aliens stole my break fluid' theory.

It is probably the same system that ACME uses. I don't recall the brand of the surge unit but the Master Cylinder is quite small and you will need to watch it as the shoes wear. If you stand it up for storage the fluid may leak also, not supposed to but sometimes they do.

Instructions note #16 http://cartowdolly.com/wp-content/up...-Procedure.pdf

[TROONORTH]

That's the strange thing. If there was a slow leak, it should be showing an accumulation of oily dust at that location. I have wiped the entire system with Kleenex tissues but found nothing. The dolly spends it's storage time horizontal, so no-go there either!

By the way, judging by your floor plan, you are driving the mirror image of our 2011 Bounder!

[Kiawah]

Been thinking about why you haven't found the leaked fluid.

The only speculation I could come up with, is if it wasn't correctly bled to start with. Suppose to start everything was empty, and someone poured brake fluid into the master cylinder, but never bled it.

Then after a number of applications, the brake fluid would have been pushed down into the lines, and the air that was in the lines came back to the master cylinder. You wouldn't see any fluid that has leaked because it displaced the air that was in the lines and cylinders.

Only possibility that I could think of.

[TROONORTH]

You know, anything is possible. On a previous dolly ( lent it to a friend who had someone drive a truck into it - not ON to it!!) I had brake problems too. The brakes on that one just didn't seem to want to come on until well after the pedal was depressed. Took it to my mechanic and they attempted to bleed the system. I got a phone call from him asking if I had tried to bleed the brakes myself. He found some kind of oil product that he compared to chainsaw bar oil in it!!! And that dolly was only a month old, so it came from the factory / dealer that way.

[TROONORTH]

Just a quick follow up on my adventures with the tow dolly. I took it in to my mechanic friend and he gave it the 'once over'. It turns out that I needed new break shoes, new wheel cylinders and new backing plates ( OK the backing plates were part of the kit so we figured what the hell, put 'em on!). The tow dolly now performs as designed with the breaks working perfectly with no shudder.

So my conclusion is, LITSTEN TO THE MAN FROM 'EZE TOW'!! You were absolutely correct! Proving once again that free advice can sometimes be worth a lot more than you paid for it.

[JohnRR]

Thank you for the update.

Post #17, Oct second

the shoes are almost new with lots of wear left in them

Why did they end up getting replaced?

[TROONORTH]

The shoes were soaked in break fluid, rendering them unserviceable.