Sounds like the PO didn't bleed the brakes well.

When bleeding, little things like:

pushing brake pedal quite a few times before bleeding
tapping calipers with small wrench (may knock loose air bubbles.)
helper who understands commands

add up. And though I'm not certain of this one, having shoes adjusted
close to where they should be may help too.

Make certain the rear brake hardware is assembled and adjusted
correctly. This make a big difference in pedal height.

I assume you looked under the dust covers of each wheel cylinder? If
one is beginning to leak, you should see it there first.

If hardware/shoes ok, replacing a wheel cylinder can be done w/o
removing hardware/shoes.

Neil.

On Sat, Feb 26, 2011 at 5:43 AM, Gregg Carlen <gregg.carlen@gmail.com> wrote:

> The seals on the brake cylinders looked okay. One of them showed signs of a
> leak when I was vacuuming out the brake dust, but I think that might have
> been because I had the hose right over one of the brake cylinder seals. It
> was just enough brake fluid to moisten the seal/cylinder area.

> One other note: After I topped off the master cylinder resevoir the other
> day and the brake pedal returned to normal height, I blead the brakes and
> got the tiniest amount of air out. Now the pedal is the correct height and
> not squishy.
>
> I'm starting to think that the most likely cause of the brake pedal
> bottoming out might have been a rear wheel cylinder seal failing and
> allowing air in/fluid out.
>

--
Neil Nicholson '81 VanaJetta 2.0 "Jaco"

http://tubaneil.googlepages.com/

http://groups.google.com/group/vanagons-with-vw-inline-4-cylinder-gas-engines