I bought a 1970 F100 earlier this year. My first bumpside. First thing I did to it was to get a brake job done at a shop, and new tires and I started daily driving it. This week I had to do an emergency stop and nearly had an accident because the brakes did not stop the truck fast enough. I can't get any wheel to lock up on heavy braking. I am thinking that the brakes need to be adjusted, but my question before I attempt this is, are these brakes self adjusting like later models?

 

All 1964 and later F100 2WD's came with self adjusting brakes. They only work (if they work at all!), when you back up and step on the brake pedal.

Pic shows self adjuster parts for right/left front & rear: 2A176/2A177 Right & Left Brake Shoe Adjusting Levers; 2A178 Cables; 2A179 Cable Guides.

The cables are notorious for snapping. And if these parts are missing, NAPA (at one time) sold a kit to eliminate them.

 

There are a couple things to consider here. 1st being that your rig came from the factory with drum brakes all around. These do not stop as well as the disc brake you are familiar with. Swapping to disc brakes in the front will help this. 2nd,now that your new brakes have worn in they should be adjusted again. The new shoes wore to match the I.D. of the old drums.

 

New brakes takes a good many miles to seat before you have better stopping for one thing.

Depending how and where you drive this vehicle may take any where from 300-700+ miles so this could be problem.
Once seated like Jeff says they'll need adjusting, and most shops who did your brakes use to adjust for free.

If you have manual brakes maybe adding just a power booster added about 25%+ better braking power.

If you did the power brakes an still unhappy then do the disc front brakes

As find parts in the junk yd is getting harder all the time. And most of the time those parts can be used as a core find needed when buying replacement parts. A lot work to do an can cost about $500-$1000 doing it yourself not cheap to have it done.
Orich

 

I dug into my brakes tonight. Adjusted the brakes manually (no self adjusters were present) and bled the brakes. The front chamber on the master cylinder was inexplicably nearly empty, no sign of leaks anywhere. Anyways after all of that, I now have a higher pedal and it stops WAY better, and I can get them to lock up if I want.

Thanks for the replies!

 

we don't have the same year model, but how can the self adjuster not be present? Where does the threaded adjuster seat? And where's the bottom spring attached to if the part listed in the picture posted previously doesn't exist?

 

The parts to manually adjust the brakes were there - the star wheel and the part that it threads into. But there was no cable, nor the clip that rests on the 'star'

 

Any time you remove the drums and how to do an inspection for one thing is over looked most of the time, is checking the wheel cylinders.

A person should roll the dust boot back enough too see if the inner cup is leaking. Or if the piston is all gummed with corrosion or leaking B-fluid.

This should not be wet with or have fluid in the out dust boot area. If any of the above looks to be then the cylinder should be serviced. Many time a cylinder can be rebuilt by honing the bore and getting a re-build kit. But if the cylinder bore is eaten up so bad that it won't clean up by honing then buy new ones.

I myself found it's better if you need your vehicle up and going faster to buy from your loco auto parts store. Because if any of the new replacement parts fail for any reason to can get a replacement part right of way. Where as buying online may take two weeks+ for turn around time.

Or the great old story of online buying getting half your order with the other parts have been "back ordered" So where does that leave you if your vehicle was a daily driver.
Pissed~~~Off

Orich

 

I'm not sure, if in reference to the "front chamber," if you're talking about the reservoir that actually goes to the front brakes or, if it's in reference to the reservoir that's physically at the front end of the MC(?).

The reservoir that's physically closest to the firewall is the primary side of the MC. The port on this reservoir goes to the front brakes.

The reservoir that's physically closest to the radiator is the secondary side and goes to the rear brakes.

If the reservoir closest to the radiator is low on fluid, there's a leak somewhere between the MC and the rear brakes.

If the reservoir closest to the firewall is low, and if you don't have a power brake booster, the fluid is likely leaking out the back end of the MC and over inside the cab and running down the inside of the firewall.

When I first bought my truck, the primary reservoir was leaking fluid down the inside of the firewall and the right rear wheel cylinder was leaking fluid into the right rear drum assembly.