Shimano Bleed Kit and tutorial

Need to bleed my brakes as I’m hoping to do a few days away Monday-Wednesday on my MTB…..not ridden in a while and brake lever pulls pretty much straight to the bar 😭

LBS turnaround time is 4 weeks currently 😳 So, I’m going to have a go myself (I’m awful at any bike maintenance!)

Nowhere local appears to have a bleed kit in stock, which means getting one from Amazon Prime.  There’s a whole host on there, is there a particular one that I should be looking for?

Also, is there a recommended how to video?

TBS Shimano Mountain Bike Bleed Kit with 100ml of Mineral oil

Cheers for that, ordered.

How easy is it to do/get wrong?!

The kits with a little bucket are a bit easier to use imo.

Shimano brakes are fairly simple to bleed ime, hard to get it too wrong. Watch a YouTube video or two, and you’ll be fine.

The tbs one uses a syringe with the plunger out as the cup so exactly the same

The “Marshy” bleed always seems simple and sensible to me.  Just make sure rotors and pads are well out of the way of any fluid!

The tbs one uses a syringe with the plunger out as the cup so exactly the same

Except presumably you can’t stopper it, which is kinda useful.

Caliper or Lever fill? God I hate bike maintenance! Cheers for the pointers.

Follow the video posted above👍🏻 as in the video a gravity bleed from the lever 👌🏻

btw – worth getting some isopropyl/brake cleaner if you don’t already have some.

Isn’t marshy method just a fluid flush on an already well bled system with a mini bleed to fi ish?

btw – worth getting some isopropyl/brake cleaner if you don’t already have some.

Yes yes yes. If it’s your first try with brakes be prepared for mess.

Have you ever bled brakes on a car or motorbike? If so, it’s the same principle.

Ha no I have not! My mechanical competence stretches to raising/lowering a seat post and pumping up tyres.

Levers come straight to the bar, is the Marshy method definitely the way to go?

I approached this job with trepidation having read all sorts of horror stories about XT brakes, and I had the infamous ‘wandering bite problem’ which many said is a design fault with XT brakes and can’t be fixed

did lots of research, inc some of the above, I got a cheap yellow reservoir off aliexpress for like 3 quid which was all it needed. The vital tool imo is a decent bike stand that will let you turn the bike 90 degrees so that the reservoir is pretty much directly above the calliper (for the rear), and then gravity does its thing.

for instructions I’d say ignore all the input from experts, download the official Shimano guide and follow that. Maybe I was lucky but it was super-easy

Levers come straight to the bar, is the Marshy method definitely the way to go?

That method just looks like a way to drop a load of fluid on the floor to me.

But bleeding brakes isn’t really too difficult a job. All you’re trying to do is get a complete run of fluid with no air bubbles. It’s helpful to consider where you might get trapped air pockets, like in the bottom of the piston opposite the bleed port, any high points in the system, or next to the hose entry point.

Personally, I like to inject from the calliper, tap around to get any air bubbles to rise, and then use the syringe I’ve just injected with to bleed down.

Gravity feeds work great too, I just find them a bit slower.

Follow the Shimano instructions is my advice. That Marshy method is messy. Definitely worth rotating the bike or at the very least removing the calliper and letting it hang free so the hose entry is upper most. If you can’t rotate the bike then also rotate the lever on the bars so it’s horizontal.

If you can’t rotate the bike then also rotate the lever on the bars so it’s horizontal.

Another advantage of the little bucket is that you can get away with a much wider range of angles, because it’s wider and holds more fluid (I really like the bucket).

Yeah I wish I’d gone for a kit with the bucket…..can’t really see how you get the syringe of the tbs one off without getting fluid everywhere?

Giving myself a 6/10 for the job….the syringe doesn’t stay on the bleed valve on the caliper very well either 😕

Certainly better than they were, I think that I need new pads too, hopefully pick some up tomorrow.  Cheers to everyone for the advice.

I’m trying the Marshy method later this week as I’m in agreement about not wanting to push crap up through the nipple.  That and I can’t get my syringe to stay on the nipple when pushing fluid through anyway. I’m not doing the rag thing though – that’s just wasting a good rag.

Will report how it compares.

You can do the marshy bleed into a bag, I’m sure this is how Shimano or epic bleed had it in the instructions. When you do it marshy style it’s quite a slow trickle of oil and the manipulation of the calliper helps get rid of the air, so may not be the same with a bag.

The bag method is with the nipple in and a small amount of tube with the calliper on.

I’ve got the Shimano catch bottle and I’m allergic to mess so it may be a clean version of the Marshy gravity bleed. I am a little loathe to waste that much fluid as well but I’ve got to redo my brakes after a lever swap/internal routing so **** it. There must have been a reason I bought a litre and I think this is it.

The Magura version of the bucket is to use an inverted syringe with a small hole near the bottom of the syringe. That lets air out, but when you want to remove it you put your finger over the hole and that stops the fluid leaking out of the syringe.