Got leaking rear brake caliper seals on my brother’s 2012 Stumpjumper Comp. The bike uses 2012 Elixir 7 SL brakes and I’ve got a spare working 2011 Elixir R SL rear caliper (with broken handlebar lever unit). My spare is unfortunately down south at the moment so can’t put them side by side to compare.

Anyone know if it is feasible to swap them over? From looking at a few images online, the hose fitting that screws into the R-SL banjo looks very similar to the hose fitting that screws into the body of the 7-SL.

Probably a seal in there to replace as well? Any advice much appreciated – give it to the LBs…?

All the Avid hoses and fittings I’ve ever worked with are standard and interchangeable.

Where’s it leaking? Out of the pistons or somewhere else? The calliper is easy to service – http://www.ukbikestore.co.uk/product/383/a15031a/avid-caliper-service-kit-elixir.html

Any advice much appreciated – give it to the LBs…?

Ditch them and get some Shimano Deores. Seriously I had some Elixirs repaired under warranty.. shouldnt have bothered and just learned the lesson sooner !

Too tight to get rid of them (yet) 🙂 but Shimano might be an option in future. I got some nearly new Elixir 9s very cheap for my SJ recently and they work pretty well I have to say.

Mrbelowski, thanks for the link, that’s a very low price for the service kit. I did look at the manual to see how hard it was to pop the pistons out and change the seals but the need to use compressed air put me off. Is there a simple way to do that with a foot pump or similar?

And yes, fluid is leaking past one of the pistons in the rear caliper. Brake still works ok-ish but not for long I don’t think.

I have changed the pistons and seals without a compressor a few times. The way I do it is to pump one piston out whilst still attached to the bike, remove brake from bike then split the calliper, drill a small hole in the other piston and pull out with a bit of wire with a bend in the end.

No, there’s no ‘nice’ way to get the pistons out without a compressor. If you need to change the piston seals then my advice is to change the pistons too. In this case you won’t need a compressor. Before you take anything apart pump the pistons out all the way. If one is lazy, hold back the other one so they both come right out. One will eventually pop all the way out (making a mess). This is fine as long as the other one is sticking right out of the calliper.

Then you can disassemble the calliper and just grab hold of the remaining piston with molegrips / pliers / whatever and drag it out the rest of the way. I think I ended up levering one out with a screwdriver, mangling it in the process.

The point is that if you don’t need to re-use the pistons you can remove them any way you like (as long as the calliper body isn’t damaged) and £7 for a pair of pistons is cheaper than buying a compressor.

You’ll end up with dot fluid all over the place – I worked in a big plastic tray. Have a spray bottle of water handy to soak the bits and bobs that get DOT fluid on them, or it’ll strip all the paint.

Thanks for that guys, I think I’ll give the caliper swap idea a try and then we can change the pistons and seals on the original caliper if that doesn’t work out. Have looked for an exploded diagram that shows if there’s a seal on that hose fitting but no luck.

Can you just unscrew one caliper and then screw the other one on? Never taken a hose off at that junction before, always been at the handlebar end with olives etc.

Yes you can. IIRC there’s a small o-ring seal that might need replacing – sometimes they’re OK, sometimes they get mashed up. Most DIY places do little bags of random o-rings that should contain something suitable. I don’t think you’ll need to fart about with olives and barbs

Great, sounds worth a go. I’ve got a box of o rings that might do the job if that one breaks. Many thanks for your help with this one!