Date:         Tue, 31 Mar 2009 22:48:34 -0400
Reply-To:     Edward Maglott <emaglott@BUNCOMBE.MAIN.NC.US>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Edward Maglott <emaglott@BUNCOMBE.MAIN.NC.US>
Subject:      Re: rear wheel cylinders
Comments: To: Ken Wilford <kenwilfy@COMCAST.NET>
In-Reply-To:  <49D20156.50404@comcast.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

Ken & A J,
while I was in my saga I started thinking about my drums being out of
spec.  Do the drums actually wear away like  a rotor on a car using
metallic pads?  I have no caliper that would go as large as I needed
to measure the drums, but with a rule they seemed to be within the
wear limit.  I did notice that when adjusted properly the pistons
were way out before the shoes hit the drums.  The drum wear probably
exacerbated my problems at least a little.

I do wonder about the automatic adjusters.  When I was doing my
testing with the drum off, lightly pumping the brake pedal, the
adjusters were really going to town.  You could see them working in
the video.  Shouldn't they take care of a "loose" adjustment in
pretty short order?  I know they don't, just wonder why.  Maybe it's
because with the drum on, the shoe travel is so much smaller?

Edward

At 07:41 AM 3/31/2009, Ken Wilford wrote:
>AJ, I can't speak to the spring or no spring problem since I always use
>German rear wheel cylinders when I do rear brakes (every time I take a
>leaking rear wheel cylinder off it is a non German one).  However I
>don't think this is your problem.  First of all, did you measure your
>drums?  Many times these are beyond the limits printed on the drum and
>need to be replaced.  If you are using new shoes with old drums there
>can be a wear in period where the new shoes need to break into the old