Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2010 14:38:30 -0700
Reply-To: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Subject: Re: Cockeyed Parking Brake Equalizer
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fwiw...
I never go through the backing plate to do any adjustment.
the rare exception is a worn drum with a big lip on the edge so the drum
won't come off easily.
it is more work, yes...
but it produces a FAR better result, to remove the drums check all around in
there ..
see what the actual stutus of thing is ..
and fix what's not right,
then do the adjusting on the self-adjuster as needed to get the shoes out
where they belong, as I mentieond in another post.
the self-adjusters are supoosed to be ....self-adjusting !
and they work pretty well at it ......
mine sure do. If they do not, something is not right.
there are two holes with rubber plugs in the backing plate.
one at the near the top on the outer edge is just so you can see shoe wear
there without removing the drum.
the other ...more in the middle , on the upper side is only there for
backing off the adjuster if it's adjusted out a long way and there is a lip
on the edge of the drum.
Normally you don't have to go throgh that hole, and it's a super pain to
back off the adjuster throgh there.
there's a big advantage to taking the drums off.
you get to see what is really what in there.
and you get to know that the drum is not terminally stuck on there.
ideally ..they just pop off after removing the two screws.
sometimes they don't.
it's a 'normal service' ..
to remove the rear drums and inspect in there.
like unless you do, you don't really know what you have.
and it is not normal or kosher in my opinion, to tweak up the self-adjuster
through there.
that's like adjusting to make up for something that is not quite right.
balance bars are never straight across.
I don't think they are suppossed to be.
as I said, I am surrounded with maybe 14 vanagons, not one has a straight
across parking brake cable balance bar.
but go through the drums...
like get them off, which is not easy sometimes at all.
but that's the only way to really know what is what in there.
then you fix that all right very nicely ..
with the tweaks and details I mentioned earlier,
then drive it nice, ............and it'll be find for a long, long time.
it's not that parts wear so much ..
it's that they are not serviced, adjusted, inspected, lubed where needed
etc..
and if I touch a brake,
I change the brake fluid to that wheel at least.
but 'do it right' with the rear brakes once...
and they are fine, if used nicely, for a long, long time.
I use ordinary bonded brake shoes..
not the rivited ones. Just ordinary decent quality ones. and always german
wheel cylinders.
but it's mainly in the attention to details. I wouldn't be surprised if I
have done 5,000 drum brake jobs in 45 + years of working on cars.
Actually ..the first time I saw american car drum brakes in about 1965 I
was shocked at how crude they were. lol !
scott
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jim Felder" <jim.felder@GMAIL.COM>
To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Saturday, July 10, 2010 10:29 AM
Subject: Re: Cockeyed Parking Brake Equalizer
Could be. If the shoes are way more work on one side than the other,
or if one side is way more out of adjustment than the other, or if
either were ever so and the PO decided to take up the slack in the
forward adjustment, then the equalizer could be cockeyed. I would
start by jacking up the wheels, popping the little rubber cover off
the adjuster hole in the backing plate, and go to town with a
flat-bladed screwdriver until you can't turn the wheel by hand, and
then back off until you can. Then you know the rear brakes are equal.
Then check the equalizer again, and if it is cockeyed, make the
necessary adjustment there. Then you will know things are right, or as
much as they can be without starting from new drums and shoes.
Jim
On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 12:22 PM, Mike "Rocket J Squirrel"
<camping.elliott@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm looking at Bentley's and what I see is the top photo on 46.9 which
> looks like there has been some disassembly done, using more than a
> screwdriver, it seems. Am I not seeing the e-z way to adjust the brakes?
>
> And, is adjusting the brakes how one gets that equalizer piece uncockeyed?
>
> --
> Rocky J Squirrel
> 84 Westfalia: Mellow Yellow ("The Electrical Banana")
> 74 Westrailia: (Ladybug Trailer company, San Juan Capistrano, Calif.)
> Bend, OR
> KG6RCR
>
>
>
> Jay lefstein wrote:
>>
>> you don't have a small / med flat screw driver? thats all it takes ;)
>> On 10-Jul-10, at 9:59 AM, Mike Rocket J Squirrel wrote:
>>
>>> Given that my parking brake doesn't do a whole lot, I climbed under the
>>> van to take some slack out of the linkage. I stopped when I saw that the
>>> equalizer (Bentleys 46.11) is at quite an angle, not at a right angle to
>>> the centerline of the van as I expected. I'm not sure what this means. I
>>> don't have the tools to adjust the brakes.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Rocky J Squirrel
>>> 84 Westfalia: Mellow Yellow ("The Electrical Banana")
>>> 74 Westrailia: (Ladybug Trailer company, San Juan Capistrano, Calif.)
>>> Bend, OR
>>> KG6RCR
>>
>
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