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Set off to work this morning and noticed the left hand (rear) Sram Rival hydro brake lever was just loose and floppy for maybe the first half of the lever pull. Brake still worked ok so I carried on.
Got home, removed pads, pumped lever to push out the pistons... and one piston is definately more reluctant to move than the other. Cleaned them as best I could, no change, in fact the braking now seemed worse. Bled the brake, twice, and still have the floppy lever, but now the braking is now piss poor, it barely locks the wheel whilst in the workstand!
What's the problem? What's the solution?
You did push the pistons back fully (ideally using an old set of brake pads so as not to damage the pistons)? Once they were back, how much flushing and brake squeezing did you do? You are absolutely certain that all air has been removed?
Got a leak in the circuit?
Hmm... I'm not 100% sure I did get all the air out, that nagging doubt... I'll bleed the brake again tomorrow and follow instructions to the T.
I did fully push back the pistons.
No leaks that I can see.
Strange how it was fine last weekend, but this morning the leber was all floppy from the off. I'll give cleaning the pistons another go too and report back.
Tried again today. When pushing fluid in from the caliper end and slowly letting the lever out it's almost as if the lever feels "notchy", it doesn't seem to extend smoothly, there comes a point where the lever is almost fully out where there's resistance and then it suddenly frees up and you can feel the plunger on the caliper syringe move as fluid is pushed into the system.
Then when putting a bit of pressure on the lever syringe the lever feels good and firm, however as soon as the syringe is removed and bleed screw replaced it's back to how it was, mushy lever and after pumping the lever a few times it develops the "floppy" lever age in for the quarter of the stroke where there's literally no resistance on the lever and it just rattles about.
Either I'm really really bad at bleeding (I followed the SRAM video on youtube), or thetes a problem, msybe at the lever...
Sounds like a reasonable enough excuse for a new bike
First time I bled my brakes I followed SRAM video guide exactly. So exactly in fact I was attempting to bleed the rear caliper and front lever (I forgot the US have their levers round the wrong way). It didn't work very well.
It's not suffering from the same issue as the guide brakes is it?
The symptoms sounds similar, where the plunger in the lever piston swells and starts to seize.
My thoughts are that there is an issue with the master cylinder. I don't think there's anything out of the ordinary at the caliper end. I'll Google the Guide issue and see what I can find.
I have the exact same issue as in this YouTube clip.
I've read that the Guide sticky piston issue can be solved by sanding down the piston to slightly refuce its diameter. I may have the same problem here, not 100% on that yet.
I'm going to try SRAM warranty first (brakes are around 12months old now), if no joy then I'll strip the lever down and see what I can see...