Minnesota Focus Owners Club

My clutch master cylinder was leaking so I replaced it with a new unit from oreileys. I noticed that it looked different from the factory piece since alot of this one was metal. I also looked like it had a check valve or something installed on one of the lines. Otherwise it looked pretty much the same. I installed it and have spent about 4 hours trying to bleed it. I did not bench bleed it and only had a few bubbles come out at the beginning. The pedal is very soft and gets just a little firmer twards the end of the pedal. I have been doing the two person method and have tried it with a syringe also. Does anyone have any tips because I am about to give up? Could there be any way that the master is wrong since the every other one I see looks green just like the factory piece? Please help me out. Thanks.

I did mine simaler to bleeding the brakes. I also have a vacuum hand pump bleeder. Might have helped a little.

The car needs to be level too. So if you have the front up on stands, put it back on the ground or jack up the rear.

Other than that it bleeds just like brakes.

I found this works good...
have some one in the car.
Pump trice, on the third pump hold.
crack the bleeder open, close the bleeder
foot up.
repeat this about ten times then wait five minutes and start working clutch pedal.
it will be weak at first but then it will firm up.

Pretty much like Focinite said, I've done several and that's how I do it.

Pump the clutch pedal 4-5 times and hold, crack the bleeder and repeat. It can take a while but it'll work.

-Steve

I have done all of those methods at least 40 times. I have only seen air some out of the system after the first few pumps. The pedal is still very squishy. I think I am going to try bleeding the brakes then the clutch again. I dont know what else to do other than try a different clutch master cylinder or to tow it so someone can pressure bleed it. Any other info would be appreciated or if someone is willing to give me a hand i would appreciate it.

When I replaced the engine in mine (which included a new clutch kit), I just gravity bled it. Worked like a charm. Maybe I'm just lucky.

Don't know what else to tell you, I've done the one in my car twice and a couple for other people as well as bleeding one that had been disassembled for over a year so that system was totally drained and it took forever to bleed it.

Try jacking it up under the driver side front. This will make the slave the high point and all the air will go up.

When I replaced mine there was some stupid little thing I was doing wrong. I can't recall what it was, maybe I didn't have the pedal attached correctly or something. Anyway I bet there is something like that you're overlooking.

Still havent gotten this figured out. I even replace the clutch master with another unit because I thought it might have been bad. No change. I brought it into NTB and they pressure bled it and a little air came out but still no pedal. The mechanic wants to reverse bleed it per Ford instructions but it wont let him either. What could be stopping us from reverse bleeding?

Is it possible you've got a break in the line somewhere?

Where are you located, what part of town?

Sorry but I never updated this. I put in 2 different units from Oreileys and neither worked. The main bodies were metal instead of plastic like the oem units. They also looked like they had a check valve on one of the tubes unlike the factory piece. The mechanic or I were never able to back bleed the unit so we thought something was wrong. I put in a oem Ford piece and I could tell instantly that it was bleeding correctly. Buyer beware on the aftermarket pieces. It is working great now.