Have laid in all new brake lines, installed new master cylinder, reworked entire rear brakes to include new wheel cylinders, springs ET. AL. cleaned and re-ferbished the front calipers.

Note: can't start motor yet, tomorrow hgolds new manifold and carb.

Tried to manually bleed the system and I get no fluid to any wheel.

The question is must I have vacuum before I can properly bleed the system or do I have a 1) booster, 2) proportioning valve 3) caliper problem I do not as yet understand?

Vehicle is a 65 Hardtop

Here is what i do to get these brakes bled.

fill the master cylinder

open all the bleeders

put some cardboard under each wheel area, hopefully you still have the wheels all off as it is much easier this way.

then go in and step the pedal to the floor and release. hopefully the master cylinder will come back, otherwise just let it sit for a while. i do this while i am doing other projects on the car so i am there to watch it on and off.

every so often give that pedal a push all the way to the floor. sooner or later you will start to see fluid at one or more of the wheels. at this point close that bleeder and proceed as before.

once you have fluid at each wheel and all the bleeders closed then you can bleed as normal.

do not forget to adjust all the brakes first and when you do this make sure to back off the emergency brake cable adjustment before you do the rear wheel adjustment.

you can adjust the emergency brake cable only after the brakes are satisfactory when stepping on the pedal.

Thanks John,

I'll beign this process tomorrow along with the swapping to a 4V maniflod and 4 brl Holly Carb.

Thanks John I do appreciate the help more then you'll ever know.

Ken

Finally got the entire system bled yesterday. Pedal got nice and firm, then we started the motor and the pedal got very soft again, slowly traveling all the way to the floor.

Should I re-bleed with the motor running so that the booster is providing the additional push?

Ken

You shouldn't have to start the engine to bleed the brakes. Sounds more like a vacuum leak or a bad booster.

OK so far, good manifold vac. So are we down to "booster is shot" or are their other things I need to rule out?

After bleeding the lines in the proper order, did you bleed the booster?