Ausi S3 8l 2000 Brake Pedal Going To The Floor

silo1714

silo1714

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Hi,

I Have recently brought a Audi S3 2000 model, when I got the car the brakes were not the best and felt very spongy. Because the car had recently had new discs and pads fitted by the previous owner I thought there might be air trapped in the system so I took it to a garage that I trust and had the brake fluid drained and replaced with dot 5, when I got the car back the brakes feel even worse and the pedal goes all the way to the floor before stopping.

I have been told that this is due to either the master cylinder or the abs pump just looking for some advise from people who have had the same problem.

I know there is probably loads of threads on this already but i cant seem to find them

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Many thanks

Simon
 
I found when I first bought mine that the brake pedal had a lot of travel before finally beginning to stop me.

Had it bled, and bled... and bled. Nothing really helped.

Seems to have settled down more recently, pedal seems to do more. Not sure if it was because I had a slight leak on the brake vacuum pipe (near top left of the engine bay - goes from the inlet manifold and runs around and alongside your charge pipe. Mine had a crack / leak on the corner near the top... got this patched up and it seems as though since then the braking has improved (or perhaps I've just gotten used to it).

Don't waste any more time with bleeding the brakes. I think it's an issue with our year car. If you find the culprit and solution I'd be interested to hear and try it my myself.
 
The previous owner could have flipped the seals in the master cylinder when he pushed the caliper pistons back when changing discs and pads
 
Thanks for the reply's im going to have the master cylinder changed and see if that solves the problem any idea on how much having this done will cost?
 
They are a bit of a fiddle, I'd imagine probably 2 hours labour and the cost of the part!
 
Ok thats great thank you, does anyone think that its worth trying to having the master cylinder bled? or am i just clutching at straws?
 
silo1714 said:
Ok thats great thank you, does anyone think that its worth trying to having the master cylinder bled? or am i just clutching at straws?
Click to expand...
I had same issue recently. I had removed calipers for painting. Painting done, put everything back together, bolted calipers on etc. started bleeding system in the correct order using a pressure bleeder. Once all corners bled, brake pedal didn't feel right, too much travel, and spongy.

Turned my attention to master cylinder, removed charge pipe and located a 7mm spanner size bleed nipple on the MC. PITA to get at. Loosened the nipple and allow fluid just to drip. That helped and gave me enough brake pressure to drive my car but still not convinced the system fully bled.
 
The guy who bled the system is a clutch and brake specialist, he took about 500ml from each corner and is convinced that there is no air at all left in the system , there were 3 of them doing the job. The car was up on the ramp one guy was in the car pumping the brakes one was up a ladder keeping the fluid topped up and the other guy was bleeding the system for about 30 mins. I will have the master cylinder changed next weekend if I am not working and re-post if this solves the problem. someone said that the ABS pump could be at fault but i am assuming its the master cylinder????
 
ok mate will do thanks, il see if I can take it to the garage and get this done tomorrow as im not very technically minded
 
Will the whole system need to be bled again or just the master cylinder?
 
Had a similar issue, would brake fine most of the time but if I was to roll down a hill, softly dabbing the brakes the peddle would get lower and lower till it gets to the floor. When it was at the floor the ESC light would come on and not switch off with the button.

Had the master cylinder changed, perfect since...

Hope this helps
 
Hi guys,

So I took my Audi to my mechanic tonight to get him to bleed the master cylinder, he had the car up on the ramp and told me that the master cylinder look new, he then tried to bleed the master cylinder but couldn't he said that he couldn't get a socket on the nipple as the bleed nipple itself is larger than the nut below. can anyone recommend a garage in the Bristol area to get this done or do I just bite the bullet and take it to Audi ????

On a positive note at least the master cylinder has been replace and my mechanic said he is 80% sure that bleeding the master cylinder would solve the problem, also I checked with him to see if it could be the ABS pump but he said as the ABS light isn't on it wouldn't be that.
 
Avoid Audi. I dont know Bristol and appreciate it is a long way, but I always use Midlands VW.
Dave
 
Did you ever solve this? I have exactly the same issue.
Thanks
 
You need to bleed the master cylinder, if you changed brake fluid and get a "long pedal" they were behind the charge pipe, on the fluid container.
 
Where do you bleed the MC? Cause theres no nipple there, you have to slightly open one of the pipes going to/from the MC am I right? Which one? ...And what a mess that will be eeh?

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errmm?

I have two nipples to bleed the master cylinder on mine.
 
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Different MCs on lhd/rhd then..hmmm.

Sent fra min SM-G925F via Tapatalk
 
Doesnt say anything about where or how to bleed it in the workshopmanual either..not that I can find atleast.

Sent fra min SM-G925F via Tapatalk
 
I'll be honest I don't remember how we bled Eriks in the end.

I do recall it being tricky not being able to bleed the master cylinder, and the pedal feel came good in the end.

I seem to think it was just a lot of pumping the pedal to get any air moving and then bleeding again via the calipers.
 
Hmm strange... its maybe not to be bled on the mc then i reckon.

When doing full bleed its all 4 calipers + slave.

Should the pedal be hard from top after bleeding or do you have to engage ABS braking for that to happen?

Sent fra min SM-G925F via Tapatalk
 
Thanks for all the replies everyone, i changed the servo & master, i bled the mc, all 4 corners & carried out the ABS bleed..this leads me to think it could be vaccum related.

I have checked all pipes & changed the suction jet under the manifold.
 
the MC is supposed to be last of all - very rare the ABS VCDS Bleed is required.

did you use a pressure bleed device eg eazibleed or do it oldskool?
 
My bad for writing the order wrong, we did bled the calipers first .yea I tried the VCDS bleed as run out of ideas.

Used the old skool method never had any probs or caused issues before when bleeding brakes on other VAG cars(s3’s included) doing it this way.

Thanks for the reply Stuart,
 
Hi,
This topic is close to my problem which is I dont have bleed nipples in my master cylinder. My car is lhd. Does anyone know whats the procedure in such case? I use gunson eezibleed and RR-RL-FR-FL brakes bleeding
 
Have you tried the ABS bleed procedure using VCDS ( I never have ), bleeding the master cylinder both times sorted out the long pedal... there doesn't seem much info on LHD procedures sorting out the issues?
 
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