Brake Shoes Wiggle

Buzz · Post by **Buzz** » Sat Jun 17, 2006 5:10 pm

I am working on replacing my brake shoes on the rear axle. The shoe on the bottom on the right side has gone metal to metal while all the others were barely worn. So, while trying to figure out why that was happening, I noticed that when I pull on the shoes near the adjusting nut (with the drum off) they wiggle all the way up and down to the edge of the back plate. The shoes on the left side do not do that. All the springs and pins seem to match, left and right sides. I will disassemble everything tomorrow when the drums come back from being turned.
I believe I have found why the bottom shoes is wearing, since it probably gets grabbed by the forward rotating drum while the top shoe hardly presses against the drum. The real question is whether the right side should be set up differently from the left to keep this from happening? Or is more likely something is worn I just cant see yet? - Buzz

jgeesen · Post by **jgeesen** » Sat Jun 17, 2006 7:37 pm

My rear lower shoes wear out 3 to 1 times faster on mine, also. Just got finished checking them - almost metal on metal - damn! These were the ones I had relined late last year! I need to find out the thickest relining material to use next time. My drums have been turned, so I have a little larger ID to work with.

Lightningpinz · Post by **Lightningpinz** » Sat Jun 17, 2006 10:53 pm

What you are seeing is "typical" to a single leading shoe brake system. The fronts of a Pinz are a double leading shoe system. The rears are a single leading shoe brake system. That means there is a leading shoe and a trailing shoe. The leading shoe hs the adjusting cam opposite to brake drum roation. The trailing shoe is set up opposite. In essence a Readers Digest is the leading shoe contacts the drum and then provides the push to the trailing shoe. In an "ideal" world both shoes would exert an equal amount of push against the drum. In reality, usually the trailing shoe provides more stopping force than the leading. That is what you are seeing.

You can probably do a web search and find a few dissertations on single leading shoe and double leading shoe brke systems

Buzz · Post by **Buzz** » Sun Jun 18, 2006 4:51 pm

Thanks for the input. That all makes sense. Funny how it has always been the right rear trailing shoe that goes first - and by a mile. I was not able to get into it today. Fathers Day for me and the shop lost the adaptor that would allow them to resurface my drums. These have been turned once already so I probably need to buy new ones anyway. I looked at my log and it has been 15 months since I last did this job. They must have gone through brakes like Chiclets when these things were in regular survice! - Buzz