I am not certain what forum I should place this thread in. Maintenance and Troubleshooting or Technical Discussion. Hope I'm making the right guess. I want to change, flush the brake fluid in my Gen. II. I know there have been many posts on the subject of brake bleeding, because I have read a number of them. I am still in the process of learning about the Prius brake system but for now all I want to do is just flush the brake fluid. There is a lot of BS on YouTube, much of it is sketchy, and some of it may be beneficial, but what I would like the communities opinion on, is one procedure that I watched. It seems very simple and if it works, I'll be on my way. Again, I am flushing not bleeding the system. No components have been replaced and there is no air in the system. Procedure: Ignition On, brake pedal depressed, open the bleeders one at a time (RT R, LT R, RT F, LT F) The system pump provides the necessary pressure to move the fresh fluid. That’s it. Oh! There were a couple of incidentals like, keeping an eye on the brake fluid reservoir and a method for keeping the brake pedal depressed. What do you all think? Can it really be this simple? If so, it is easier than bleeding an old traditional system.
Following as I want to bleed and replenish my car with fresh brake fluid. Just acquired recently with 195K and I don't know the history. Front pads look fresh but the rear shoes look thin and need to be replaced. This Prius is my first hybrid. For my Hondas and older Corolla, I've always gravity bled the brake lines.
You can gravity bleed these brake lines too. I've done it a couple of times. If your fluid looks good in your reservoir which generally they all do you can just let it run out of a rear wheel cylinder until it's almost empty Do you see it start to disappear out of the feed tubes. Then let it continue to run out of that side on the rear for another 5 minutes close it off and open the other side let it run about 5 minutes I should put the back with fresh fluid. There's no need to be flushing that would probably do more damage than good reliable to loosen something and get it caught inside the internals of the actuator and then well have a problem there Why? The system stay very clean the pH of the brake fluid will change over time which can be problematic there are test strips for it if it's a big concern Prius doesn't have a lot of problem with overheating brakes and all this kind of stuff and the electric motor breaking does very well so.
