You may have made the rear adjusters turn up a few clicks. Now go see that the rear brakes are actually set up correctly including the contact pattern with the drums. Many after-market shoes have the wrong lower shoe arm length and the lower shoe rests need to be shimmed out to compensate. I have added as much as 3-4mm to each rest even with new drums. Be sure the handbrake cable is properly adjusted, no pressure on the top bar when released. And als make sure the top springs are not upside down. Dennis
-----Original Message----- From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of Dick Wong Sent: Monday, July 6, 2015 12:55 AM To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM Subject: Brakes on an 87 Syncro So I think I've read threads here about brake pedal height, before and after bleeding and after replacing master cylinders, etc. My 87 is still relatively new to me, I have no idea what pads, rotors, shoes and drums are on it. I recently rebuilt the front calipers (no pad change), stainless braid all around, adjusted the rear drums and installed a new master brake cylinder. Everything seems normal and my new brake pedal height is the same as with the old M/C after pump-up. Then I read a thread somewhere that said the driver could lock up their front wheels in a panic stop. I decided to try this: 1. To see how the van would handle in this situation, 2. To see if I could get my brakes to lock up, and 3. Get an idea of the stopping distance I may need in a "situation". I only did this in town with a top speed of around 35MPH. I could not get any of the wheels to lock up, but after the second try, I realized that it would never happen on dry pavement since all four wheels are coupled together in the Syncro system (the previous statement must have been with a 2WD). The handling was straight and true with no side to side pulling, and the nose diving was not as severe as I thought it would be. All the while, learning what type of distances I need to make a stop. Thanks for sticking with me to this point. So here is my observation after a few hard stops. The brake pedal now has resistance sooner, i.e., the pedal is a bit higher for a regular stop. How much, I can't really say, but it definitely feels higher and BETTER (slightly less mushiness). So what do you think happened here? -Dick Wong- 78 Scirocco Original Owner 87 Vanagon GL Syncro 2.5 (Blaze) Third Owner 12 Golf TDI Original Co-Owner |
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