Rear Brakes

[Lord Sorbington]

The handbrake on my saloon is rubbish so I'm planning to clean and lube the rear brakes in an effort to sort it.

Any top tips for carrying out this job?

[Richard B]

Quite often I've found this is down to worn drums.

Replacement of the shoes clears the problem, but you do not get the full life of the shoes.

[AlanChatterton]

Bound to be seized Sorbs.

Remove all the rear brakes and get the handbrake linkage out. Clean and put a spot of copperslip on the pivot, then re-assemble.

To set the brakes, undo the handbrake cable from the back of the arms. (the one you have just cleaned)

Pull the handbrake lever back into the backplate, ie fully off, then get someone to stamp on the brake pedal a few times. This will adjust the brakes.

When both sides done, re attach the handbrake cable. You will need to slacken this off first (2 adjusters, one under the car by the compensator, one behind the wheel on one side).

Have a look at the trailing arm article on the 2000 Register website, shows you how to do this.

[shenderson]

Rather than rely on the self adjusters, after stamping on the pedal, I always remove the drums again and lever the shoes out a bit further to get some more adjustment.  I can usually get at least a couple of clicks.  Take care not to let the shoes move up or down when doing this.

The rubber boot over the handbrake lever through the back of the drum gets perished, allowing water in to accelerate the seizure of the pivot.  Howeve rthe presence of a good boot does not prevent the seizure!

Steve H

[CRAJ]

Rear brakes need to be setup correctly,my handbrake was rubbish until I reset the adjusters. You will need to disconnect the cables(lube the adjusters, pivot points etc), reset the self adjusters as you would if renewing the shoes(assuming the shoes are ok still). Find some way of pinning the handbrake levers at the back of the drums, up against the drums, tyraps,elastic straps or strong string. Get an able assistant to stand on the brake pedal, whilst you listen to the adjusters clicking up in the drums. Remove the straps on the handbrake levers and spin the drums. Repeat these steps as many times as you need to, until no more clicks are heard.Reassemble handbrake cables and adjust as needed, you may need to slacken the adjusters off a bit, to reconnect at the back of the drums. Your handbrake should be fine now, and you may well find that the brake pedal has less travel too.
I did this a couple of weeks ago and found that before adjustment my car would barely hold against me pushing it on flat ground, now it will hold on 1 in 5 no probs.

[Lord Sorbington]

Excellent advice as usual, thanks.  I tend not to use the handbrake much, not really needed on an automatic!

I've just had a quick look and both pivots seem free.

The car came close to failing its MOT in October as the handbrake was a bit marginal.  It passed, but after the test I greased the cable and pivots which made things far better.  The only ones I didn't do were the pivots inside the drums.

It still takes a good bootful of throttle to drive off against the handbrake but I'm sure that it could be better.  I may sort this out at the weekend.

Richard, I hadn't really considered worn drums as a possibility so thanks for that thought!