Help Remove rear Brake Drums

[rob987_0]

Hi, now that we have decent (ish) weather I've started to do some work on my car. I'm a total newbie so I'm still learning. Anyway, I want to take the rear beam off to refurb it. I am stuck at the point of removing the brake drums. I've removed the four bolts from each drum but they still won't budge. Is there something else I'm missing or are they just rusted on?

Also, does the cable simply un clip from the drum?

Cheers

 

[trueblue]

The drum should just come off but looking at the picture you need to remove the ABS sensor. There are a couple of roll pins that are more than likely holding it together, look between the bolts top & bottom. If it is just the drum you want to clean up then you do not need to remove it from the back. It comes away from the front leaving the shoes and back plate intact.

 

[zinc2000]

You will need to remove the drum first to free the hand brake cable from the shoes..

30mm socket removes the hub nut (you need a decent long bar as well on the socket) remove bearings the drum will pull off, can take a bit of effort to get it over the shoes if it has worn a bit, cable is then accessible although you will find it easier to remove the brake shoes first to unhook the cable.

 

[quest63]

Theres a bolt holding the sensor to the back of the drum, in theory when the bolts out the sensor should just pull out.

However its likely siezed in and youll have to take the front of the drum off and knock it out with a small socket and a hammer (which will require bolting back to the beam again). However there is a fair chance that this will beak the sensor (although I got away with it)

The drum is probably siezed to the beam and will need a little pursuasion to knock it off.

You'll need a big torque wrench 235nm iirc to tighten up the hub nut and you may need a new hub nut as well as they are only supposed to be reused a couple of times (mine came apart after its fourth re use)

 

[YOG]

You are using the recommended Ford method by removing the 4 bolts. This will leave the drum and hub assembly together, so you won't need to re-torque the hub nut/bearings.
However, you do need to remove the ABS sensor first.
You probably have a "lip" worn on the drum, and the brake lining is catching on it.
Once removed, you should be left with the following:

Drum Brakes, Drum/Hub Assembly removed.

• YOG
• May 20, 2010

Some reasons for undoing the hub nut are, you cannot undo the 4 bolts, you cannot remove the ABS sensor from the rear and have to punch it out from inside, replacing bearings/drum/hub.

 

[zinc2000]

Above makes sense if you are not wanting to renew bearings, nice to know that Ford recommend it rather than destroying the hub nut needlessly....thanks for that tip....things you learn on this forum :thumbs:

 

[rob987_0]

Thanks for all the help! I managed to get them off.

So after removing the four bolts at the rear, I then removed the small bolt for the ABS sensor and pulled the sensor out. I then managed to hammer a thin screw driver in between the beam and the drum to pry them apart. Just needed plenty of force!

I've put the drums on top of upside down buckets whilst I removed the beam. Just need to get the beam refurbished now.

 

[quest63]

:thumbs:

 

[zinc2000]

Going to use same method to remove my rear drums again after brake rebiuld as handbrake is refusing to even try to hold the car!!