When and how often do you bleed your brakes?

Me and a few buddies a work kinda of got into this last night, my position is that every time I do a brake job i bleed the little bit of air out of them, there position is that it isn't even necessary to bleed the brakes when you do a brake job, I think its good idea to bleed them, they were like hell no your just wasting your time, Can somebody help me convince them its a good idea, or I am just wrong?

You are definately not wrong in the slightest.. any time you do a brake job you should bleed the brakes. If you have an older car or truck.. its even a good idea to get them power bled at a brake shop every other year or so to keep the lines clear. Not sure how you can convince them otherwise though.. you dont "Have" to bleed your brakes.. but unless your lucky.. they probably wont work correctly either. Just my 2 cents

Tunes67

anytime i have done brakes on my truck i have bled them. i have been told that if theres any air in them it could make them not work properly, and i dont know about you, but i rather be safe than sorry when it comes to something thats going to stop my speeding vehicle.

what do you guys mean by brake job?? new pads? cuz if you just put new pads in then you dont have to bleed them. but if your putting on new calipers and everhting then obviously you have to cuz you disconnect the line from it so all the fluid leaks out.

ya, im assuming he means replacing the whole lines or at least the calipers. i sure dont hope your bleeding them after just changing the pads! haha

So the next day we drove to different brake shops and learned two things that he was confusing bleeding the brakes with replacing the brake fluid with new one, and when working on brakes for any reason, do not force the caliper pistons back into the caliper without first releasing the caliper bleeder screw. not following this simple step is inviting certain disaster and can have a dramatically negative effect on the longevity of the brake system. the calipers are located at the lowest point of the hydraulic system and tend to collect particles released from suspension in the fluid. Compressing the pistons forces this contamination back through the system causing other component failures. Always open the bleeder screw allowing contaminated fluid to escape before pushing the piston inward. Remember, it is better to strip a bleeder screw than to contaminate the ABS unit!

Exactly.. and in addition.. any time you crack a bleeder screw.. you are introducing air into the brake system that must be bled back out.

Tunes67