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@gbj_tester
Water is an excellent hydraulic fluid with just a few tiny drawbacks. It boils at a rather low temperature - no problem on a trials bike, where little energy is dissipated in the brakes, but disastrous on something which has to be stopped from high speed. Also, it's a strongly polar solvent, so highly corrosive in environments containing dissimilar metals, e.g. steel hose couplings inserted into aluminium callipers. Freezing is a problem too, as ice takes up more space than the water from which it was made, and it's surprising how much force it will exert on a closed vessel as it tries to express this tendency - enough to crack your callipers, probably, since it can quite easily crack granite mountains to a fine rubble given half a chance.