I removed the hubs to do the job and to replace the backing plates it is essential. The additional cost of removing the hubs is about an additional $100 in seals and will save a heap of trouble in doing the parking brakes. I also have the bed off of this truck, which provided me more access than you will get with the bed on.

There are several write ups for doing the hubs in the tech folder so I'll pass on expounding on that process except to say that I have a yuuuuge crow bar that I used to pry the hubs off. If prying the hubs off pry against the four stud heads for mounting the bracket to the axle to avoid damaging the back plate.



Once the hubs are off it looks like this...except with a lot of rust...and gunk if the seal is leaking.



The first thing to do is remove the bottom spring.



A brake spring tool is helpful with this process. I found that it tears the shoes up so I did not use it to re install the springs.



Next (or you can remove it as first step), remove the clip that holds the left shoe to the plate and left shoe ONLY, leave the right shoe attached. I used a pair of pliers to hold the stem still and turned the clip with my hands until the slot lined up and released the shoe. Then pull out the brake adjuster from the bottom and the top, outer spring.

I was not able to remove the top inner spring with the shoes in place, nor was I able to install the spring after the shoes were replaced during reassemble. So...once the outer spring is off take a big screwdriver and pry the left shoe out and over the top part that it rests on.



Once you have that shoe out and over you can release that back spring manually, then you can remove the right shoe from it's parking spot.

You should remove and service the parking brake actuator as they rust solid and I suspect that they cause the bulk of the parking brake problems.

First you have to remove the cable from its roost. It has clips on it similar to those that hold the fuel lines in place. I found that a pair of regular pliers squeezed around them released them nicely. Then the cable end just weaves out of the actuator assemble. There is no shot of it in its place when assembled (sorry).

I should also add that the front section of the parking brake cable had broken off and any tension on the cable had been released. I do not know what, if anything, has to be done if it is intact, you might have to disconnect it at the junction on the frame right behind the cab or loosen it elsewhere. Having the bed off was probably more of a convenience than I realized.



Once the cable is disconnected the actuator assembly just slides out of it's hole. The only thing holding it in place is the shoes and springs. This was rusted fast and would not move.



I lubed it up and used a hammer to break it loose. It is made with a lot of clearance in there and I was able to get a hack saw inside it and clean it out. I have a hacksaw blade holder, which saves hands and gloves but you could protect your hands with gloves to work it in there.



And here it is at work.



Next was to remove the mounting bracket that everything is mounted on (I don't know what they call it). It comes off pretty easy with a 15/16" wrench (I don't know the metric conversion but 15/16" fit like a glove). There are four studs you see sticking out from the back side of the plate.



The studs run through the backing plate and into that bracket. They are not threaded to the end and they hammer out easily enough that I didn't need to protect them from distortion during removal. They come out fairly easily with either an air chisel or a regular claw hammer.

Here it is ready for action.



After removal of the studs here are the knuckle and the old plate. The old plate was pretty much in love with that knuckle and it did take some effort to separate them. That knuckle is thick forged steel and pretty much indestructible.





That rusty old plate weighs more than the Dorman replacements do from the factory. The big notch in it is where the caliper goes.

That's disassembly, I'll take a break and go through the cleanup and reassembly later.

 

Nice write up Mark, reps sent.

 

Same thoughts as Adam and reps sent as well.

 

I'm planning on doing the job this week. Did you replace the rear bearings while you had them out?

 

I did not, the truck has 72,000 miles on it and the bearings look good as new. I'll follow up with reassembly soon.

 

Just to add, 2 things.

1.) The "actuator" ( the thing that always seizes up ) IS available new from the dealer. I believe I paid about $20-$30, but I needed one asap locally. You could probably get it cheaper from a mail order dealer like Auto Nation White Bear Lake ( formerly Tousley).

2.) If you find yourself needing most of the parts, including a new backing plate, hardware, etc..., the ENTIRE assembly is available new from the dealer. It comes with a new "knuckle", backing plate, and has ALL of the parking brake components pre-assembled and ready to bolt on as a single unit. Its not cheap, but it gets you everything, including some parts you can't buy otherwise. Plus, it is a whole lot faster and less aggravation.
When I did my rear brakes/parking brakes a while back, I discovered that my knuckle casting was broken. The hole that the brake cable goes through and locks onto was half missing, so it was a "c" instead of an "o". The knuckle itself is NOT available as a separate part. You have to buy it with all the parking brakes parts attached.
Part# are:
4C3Z2209AA .. "Drum in Hat" Park Brake Assy-Right Rear / 4C3Z2209AA replaced: YC3Z2209FA.

4C3Z2210AA .. "Drum in Hat" Park Brake Assy-Left Rear / 4C3Z2210AA replaced YC3Z2210CA.

They are about $440-$475 PER SIDE

 

Also, another tip I learned the hard way.... If you are doing the bearing in the hub, don't forget to transfer over the oil slinger from the old bearings. Its a thin metal disc with 4 "teeth" ( the teeth face out away from the truck, but towards the inner bearing). If it has less then 4 teeth, they probably broke off, and you need a new slinger. It goes between the inner bearing and the seal.
When you take the old seal out, the seal often comes apart/looks mangled. Its easy to mistake the slinger for a broken part of the seal and throw it out. That's what I did the first time I did the bearings. They are available new from the dealer. The part# is BC3Z-4670-B
They are $1.65 from Tousley:
Hub Spacer | Genuine Ford | BC3Z-4670-B : AutoNation Ford White Bear Lake | Parts & Accessories

Here is it what it look like: ( Its the piece in the middle)
http://www.thedieselstop.com/forums/...ngers-hub4.jpg

 

OK, back at it...I painted things up during the process so I had to clean things up in preparation. I had one seal that had been leaking a little so there was gear oil all over the brake shoes and the outer axle tube towards the frame. Due to this I had to replace the parking brake shoes on that side and clean up the axle tube to accept paint. I had already done the other side and reused the brake shoes, they were in good shape and don't get much use anyway.

I found that acetone was worthless on the heavy oil so I used methyl ethyl keytone (MEK), which is a nasty, effective solvent. Do not sniff at it (you'll have plenty of opportunity to smell it without trying) and either work outside or in a well ventilated area. By well ventilated I mean having open doors on both sides so the air currents can remove the vapors, I would not use a fan in a one door garage.

MEK in a SS bowl that I use and a solvent brush to clean the axle. After it dried I wire brushed it with a drill and wire brush then painted it with Eastwood's Rust Encapsulator. It seems to be their version of Rustoleum, it needs no priming and I kind of like how it went on.

Here's how it looked cleaned up. The seal mounts on that edge right next to the real rusty part so you want to get that clean and smooth as possible. It is better than it looks in the picture.



Here it is with two coats of paint...



And the knuckle wire brushed and before paint.



Next we mount the backing plate and the knuckle. There are a few ways you can do this. The first is lay the knuckle on it's back on top of a 4x4, put the backing plate in place and drive the studs in with a hammer. This works fine but the back of the knuckle isn't flat and you need to work it around on the 4x4 a little. Studs go in easy enough. Another way is to place the knuckle onto the axle and put the backing plate on on top of it. Then insert the studs, put the nuts on and draw the studs in with the nuts. This is kind of tedious. Then you could do a combination of the two, place the parts on the axle, start the studs with nuts, then drive the studs home right on the axle. That third option worked the best, too bad I thought of it last.

Plate and knuckle attached to axle. It doesn't take much to figure out how the plate mounts but you do want to make sure that you get the right plate on the right side, that gap is where the caliper mounts to the rear of the axle (unless you have an E99 in which case one mounts to the front of it).



There are rubber boots for the actuators that come with the backing plates, now would be the time to insert them into their slots. They do not come with the brake spring kit though.



Then insert the actuator into place. With the jaws on the actuator closed the hole in it for the cable will be far opposite the mount for the brake cable on the knuckle.

On the actuators...they do not appear to have been lubricated from the factory but were galvanized to prevent rust. They have a lot of clearance (slop) in the mechanism to prevent rust up, which only lasts so long. After cleaning them I worked a little brake lube into the crevices with a toothpick but not too much. IMO the other option would be to buy new actuators because much of the galvanize had been rusted through on them. If buying new actuators I would recommend going OEM because I would expect the galvanize to be better than they would be on say...Dorman's. And I'll bet that Ford charges a lot of money for that little part. Only time will tell how long that fix lasts.

Next is time to install the shoes. I started with the one on the right and I used a pair of needle nose Vise Grips to hold the clip closed and in place to install the retaining clip. It does collapse the spring a little but not enough that it won't work. This holds the clip closed enough to get the pin in and spun, then release the Vise Grips. I don't think that this method will work with the hub in place. Note the angle of the pliers to skirt around the axle tube.



After this shoe is attached install the large spring inside on top. First to the right shoe, then attach it to the left shoe. That spring can be a bugger to get in there and if you can get it to stay in the right shoe while clipping the shoe in it would be nice but it's tricky with that spring dangling around while you try to fasten the shoe. There does not seem to be an up or down, left or right to this spring even though it is not symmetric.



Now you're got both shoes hooked together with the top inner spring it's time to pry that left shoe up into place. This is the only way I could get them in.



Then attach the left shoe fastener with the same Vise Grip method I used on the right one.

Next install the brake adjuster. The brake adjusters were in great shape, no rust and worked free and easy so I reused them instead of the ones that came with the spring kit. Then install the bottom spring. I used the needle nose Vise Grips to grab the end of the spring and stretch it to it's final resting place, it's not that strong of a spring.



Note that the adjuster is fully collapsed and cog towards the front. The spring is also the detente for the adjuster so it rubs against it. This spring's ends are centered on the spring so there is no up or down (you'll understand when we get to the next spring).

The upper outer spring's hooks are offset on the body of the spring, not centered like the others.



This is because they needed to get the spring up and away from the hub. If not installed properly the hub will rub on this spring.

Note how it's hooks sit above the hooks on the inner spring and I placed it with the hooks to the bottom of the spring to get it as high as possible.



It does rub on the parking brake actuator. I don't know if it's supposed to (actually doubt it) but I decided to leave it that way because there is minimum movement of those parts and I didn't want to ruin a seal trying it flipped over to see if it rubbed on the hub. If you can, pay close attention to this piece during disassembly, I know, I should have taken pictures.

Here is the other side finished up except that top spring had to be changed around because the hub hit it when I went to install it.



That picture also shows the brake retaining clips that Dorman provides with the backing plates. They have to be squeezed down then slid into place and I didn't like them, so I used the other style on the other side.

 

Mark,
That top spring on the back side looks pretty stout so I don't know if this will work here.
However in the past I have just put it on both shoes and then installed them on the backing plate, placing one into the correct position and using a brake spring tool or a streight shaft screwdriver to pry the other side into place. Just an FYI for those that have not had the "pleasure" of doing this yet.

 

I flushed the brake lines yesterday with new fluid and replaced all of the calipers and pads today. I thought I needed to replace my parking brake pads, but when I took off the rotor, the pads were ~20% thinner than the new ones I purchased.

While the rotors were off, I confirmed the parking brake pads do move outward when I press the parking brake as expected in a drum-brake scenario.

Two Questions:
1) Does anyone know of the part number for the "parking brake seal" that is on the inside of the wheel assembly? (e.g. opposite side of the wheel studs) Mine are missing, and this truck sees a lot of desert. I cleaned a lot of desert out today.

2) I have a tool to use the aforementioned port to make the adjustment, but I have no idea how to use it. It looks like a piece of bent metal. Can anyone offer some guidance on how to use it? I can't tell if I am tightening or loosing when I use it.

Thanks,
Mike

 

Are you talking about that oval rubber plug that goes into the brake adjustment slot? If you are I gots extras, two extras came with the Dorman backing plates and more came with the spring kit.

If you do a lot of mechanical work and don't have to do that righty tighty, lefty loosey thing every time you touch a wrench you can look at the picture of the adjuster I have there and you should understand how that works. The threads are on the piece on the right so...looking at the adjuster in that pic you would spin the star up, on the back side spin it down to adjust the brakes.

 

Yes the oval plug -- I filled it with a little (just enough to make a seal and not go into the caliper) high temp RTV.

Your picture helped a lot. It is hard to know if the bolt head is facing the front or back without being able to see inside. Bottom to top worked adjusting from the back plate! My parking brakes are now fixed and it will hold 9,000 lbs still at a 30 degree angle in neutral.

BTW -- nice work on your project. Here is a product we started using on the race car, Mav Coat Steel Shield. Polish off the rust and grim and spray it on. It is more oil-like than paint going on. We'll see how it holds up to Vegas to Reno next month. If it works good, I'm going to do the underside of the truck with it. (It is also “weldable”, which is why we didn’t got with paint or powder coat on the race car frame)

I finished up my undercarriage project this week: brake fluid flush, 4 new brake calipers and brake shoes, parking break adjustment, new leaf spring bushings and new sway bar bushings. Much needed, handles way better.

 

PM me your address and I'll stick two plugs in a regular envelope and send them to you.

Oh, and don't run that #9000 brake test too often, it could turn ugly in a heartbeat.

And congratulations on all the heavy work, you had your hands full.