Noooo – Mineral Oil in Brand New Hope Brakes

BOLLOCKS

Brand new Hope Tech 4 V4. Just shortened the hoses (as per the Hope videos).

Topped up the reservoirs. Realised my Halfords click and collect gave me Mineral Oil not Dot 5.1 as I had ordered. Arrrgggh.

So the good news is I haven’t used the brakes. But the bad news is what is in the reservoir is now a mixture of factory supplied Dot 5.1 and Mineral Oil. The cap and diaphragms on both are done up.

Full bleed next? I can’t get to a shop to get Dot 5.1 until tomorrow.

FS bollox what a bugger.

The other way round is much worse! I could be wrong but I would syringe out the reservoir first, then a full bleed, ideally from caliper up and then no mineral oil has really gone anywhere….  I think you will be fine.

Remove the hoses from the caliper and lever

Drain out the fluid from the caliper, lever and hoses

Liberally spray them with IPA getting plenty in the holes in the caliper and lever. Pop the top cap off the lever too and give it a good spray

Drain off the IPA and leave it all to dry overnight then reassemble with the right fluid. Give it a good bleed a couple of times

Cheers all operation drain and spray now in progress…

When I was working in the bike shop I had a guy come in with a Shimavid set up.  Shimano lever with Avid Juicy caliper.  He didn’t know what type of fluid was in it.

Apparently it had been OK for a year but was starting to feel a bit sticky.

I asked him who the hell had done it and apparently it was the previous mechanic at our shop.  I declined to work on it and offered him a decent discount on a new brake.

Long story short, clean it out thoroughly and I reckon it’ll be fine.

I would soak them in hot water with lots of washing up liquid.

Edit: Just the levers with the reservoir open and hoses removed so the detergent can work through the system.

Right so I syringed out the reservoirs then sprayed the levers with IPA.

Drained the hoses and ran IPA through them.

Removed the bleed nipples on the calipers, disconnected hoses and sprayed with IPA.

The last thing I did was push pads back before topping up so very little fluid in calipers.

I’ll leave to dry overnight and then reassemble / bleed etc in the morning.

I guess the only thing the mineral oil will have touched would have been the reservoir diaphragms. I’m hoping an hour max won’t do any damage.

Think I’ll need a beer after all that, I’ll try not to get my IPAs mixed up.

I guess the only thing the mineral oil will have touched would have been the reservoir diaphragms. I’m hoping an hour max won’t do any damage.

I think you will know if you didn’t catch it in time, mineral oil makes them swell significantly

I think you will know if you didn’t catch it in time, mineral oil makes them swell significantly

Mmm I’m trying to not think they look a little out of shape.

Could be a lot worse, you’ve done it to the one brake where all the tiny bits are replaceable. And(once you have dot) you can keep pushing fluid from the top to flush them

Yeh cheers I’m not stressing. It’s extra work put me back a day on the bike build but no worries I don’t think any permanent harm has been done.

I thought this thread was going to be about Hope switching to mineral oil in a new brake model, I’m a bit disappointed it’s not 😀

You can buy mineral oil Hope Brakes. But it might only be for flatmount

I did this building up a new bike, with some old brakes.

Already done 3 pairs of shimano, and just autopiloted the Hopes. Completely filled them.

Realised the following morning and just did a MASSIVE bleed. Put about 50 mil through the brakes. They are fine ~6 months later.

Cheers all.

I reassembled and filled / bled this afternoon. I’m sure things will be fine. Just a PITA. Went into Halfords today to get more Dot 5.1 bought a 1/2 litre from off the car shelf. Looked at the bike shelf, mineral and 5.1 side by side. No wonder Halfords picker did what they did. Saw brake fluid thought that’ll do.

No point getting shitty with em. Life’s too short.

No need to get shitty, I agree, but if you don’t alert them to it then they don’t learn and put measures in place to prevent it happening again.

Fair comment

Let’s have a screen shot of the halfords receipt showing there alleged incompetence