Hello everyone. I replaced all the springs, drums, shoes, and wheel cylinders in my 1997 f250hd rear brakes with all brand new parts and the passenger rear wheel drum is a bit snug. The driver side rear drum slides on easy and has very light drag on the shoes. I have the adjusters on both wheels as far in (compressed) as they go. I can get the right rear drum on and turn it by hand but it feels like it has a good amount more drag on the shoes compared to the left rear drum. I tried opening the bleeder and compressing the shoes but no difference was noticed. I was chalking it up to everything being new and might just need to get worked in? What do you guys think?

 

My guess would be the parking brake cable on that side is binding up some and not fully releasing. First I would make sure the parking brake is not adjusted too tight, then try getting at the lever on the back side of the rear shoe with something and try gently working it back.

 

I was wondering about that. My parking brake cable has a lot of slop/play as it's hanging from the frame. When i apply the parking brake and then release it, the cable doesn't snap back like it does in my ford ranger. Look at these springs.

 

Either one of the parking brake cables could be seized and causing a problem, but also make sure you have the correct brake shoes on each side. It doesn't appear to be common knowledge but there is a front and a rear shoe and the trailing shoe has a little more friction material on it, so the other possibility is that you have both rear shoes on one side which would make a for a tight fit.

 

It was actually this part that I'm pointing to with the pick in the picture

that was pushin the rear shoe out enough to drag the drum pretty badly. Now after grinding away a good 1/16 of the side here, the wheel rotates freely. I need to adjust the shoes outward now.

 

Nevermind.

 

Is that axle seal leaking?

For the drum to tight, it's worth looking at the new drum to make sure it was cut true. I bought a new one that was mega tight. Removed it to inspect and saw the brake surface was off set from the center hole...took it back for a refund/exchange.

 

Lots of el-cheapo drums are not true or not even the right size, lots of folks routinely turn new drums to prevent callbacks. Quality control isn't what it was, may have been stored improperly, or dropped.

 

^^^^^ Try swapping drums left/right, that would tell you if it's a drum quality issue.

But my money's on that parking brake cable. Try disconnecting it from the shoe and see if it retracts further.

Either that, or the above-mentioned mis-location (left/right, leading/trailing) of the shoes. You shouldn't have had to grind anything off the notches like that; that's what suggests they might be mixed up.

Hard to tell from the pics, but looking at the bottoms of the two shoes, and the distance between the end of the friction material and the end of the shoe base, it looks like that's the same distance on both shoes. This hints that maybe indeed this side has both trailing shoes.

 

Axle seal isn't leaking i just sprayed lube in there to get old parts off.

I tried swapping drums and they both felt the same. I put the correct shoes in the fronts and backs but im glad you guys mentioned that in case i didn't. Im gonna bleed the brakes today and hopefully take it out for a drive if my brake pedal feels good.