solo bleeders and spiders

last night i was finally back in action. ran into a new nemesis and a couple old ones. the new nemesis i ran into was something called a solo bleeder. they replace your brake bleeder screws and are supposed to help you bleed brakes. they have a spring with a little brass ball attached that acts like a one-way valve when you crack them open. this way you can bleed the brakes by yourself. i had installed them on my rear drums but when i went to bleed them last night, they were too big for the bleeder hose that i had. so i went to remove them and just put the stock ones back in (make sure you always save old parts!). to my surprise, the little brass ball got stuck in both of my wheel cylinders! luckily, i was able to pull them out with some needle-nose pliers but there was a lot of heart palpitation, some slight swearing and good ol' nervous sweating. not surprisingly, i'll be putting in an RMA request to get my money back on these things.

i tried to make some progress last night but i didn't get too far. i bled all the brakes but i'm still getting a lot of air bubbles. i think that i got some air into the master cylinder which could prove to be a nuisance. i can't get a firm pedal at all. hopefully i can keep bleeding it and get all the air out. i really don't want to have to get a power bleeder or try and bleed the master cylinder by itself. since i can't get it off the car, this would prove pretty hard.

i ended up going in last night after a large scale battle with a couple of spiders. for those of you who know me, you know that i really, really hate spiders and i'm scared of them. so even killing a spider is a tough job for me. anyway, it was almost 8:00 last night, really dark and these two really ugly, big spiders are in one of my fenders looking like they want to kill me. but i got the better of them and then decided it was time to go in.

doing all this work has not only taught me about my car but it's also acclimated me to the insects of TN. spiders, all sorts of flying things and maybe the grossest... ticks. i realized monday that i had a little friend living off of me and i found another one this morning. luckily, i've been able to pull both out, heads and all and so far no sign of lyme disease. this is just another reason to work on getting some sort of garage at our house. working outside is just the pits. but hopefully i'll be done soon. keep those fingers crossed!