Handbrake lining wear

[gromit]

After getting my S2 109" mobile I found that the handbrake 'juddered' at low speed. As this is the only way of braking at present I thought I'd better try and sort the problem.

Initially I replaced the gearbox mounts but this didn't fix the problem.
Then I dropped the rear propshaft and removed the handbrake drum (interestingly the bolts holding the propshaft to drum and the drum in place were BSF) and found one shoe had worn away the lining at one end. When I say worn away I mean about 25% was missing, rivets worn away but luckily just very minor damage to the shoe. The other shoe was hardly worn.

Looks like one shoe has been dragging while the vehicle was driven but I need to track down what has caused it. Return springs are OK, adjuster seemed to be free but I'll check later in the week, the operating mechanism did seem to be loose on the backplate. Strangely the drum itself looks OK.

Went into a brake/clutch place in Dandenong today and got a brand new set for $18 cash (last set ). The old set are being relined for $15 but I have to wait a couple of weeks because they get them from a company in WA.
Part Number is 1418, the guy there even quoted the part number without looking it up, that's 26 years in the industry for you.

Anyway, back to the problem...I'm doing this from underneath on a gravel driveway so it's awkward to say the least, is there anything I should be looking for....



Colin

[Blknight.aus]

bad adjustment from the get go and possibly a sticking expander.

pull down, give it a clean and lube and see how it moves without the drum on (wrap the shoes in some rope to give them some resistance and return motivation)

[JDNSW]

Operating mechanism is meant to be loose on the backplate but with a flat spring plate from memory so it is not "loose" (I seem to remember there are two types). This is the mechanism for equalising between the shoes. If the spring plate is missing or broken the lower shoe will probably be rubbing on the drum all the time.

John

[wagoo]

Theoretically, transmission brake linings should hardly wear at all.But series Landy ones wear out. Why? Well, the front spring shackles are behind the axle, so when the front wheels ride over bumps the front axle moves back slightly on the shackles. In 4wd the front propshaft slip joint binds a little, so that the rearward movement of the front axle is transmitted to the transfercase which also gets pushed back on its rubber mounts. However, the handbrake bellcrank that attaches to the pullrod on the brake shoe expander is bolted to the chassis, so everytime the vehicle rides over bumps the handbrake is partially activated.A worn or dry slip joint on the front propshaft can bind even in 2wd.
Later 2As and 3s have a rubber bushed rod between gearbox and chassis that reduces transmission movement, but it still moves enough to wear the linings if the linkage is over adjusted.
Bill.

[Blknight.aus]

If thats happening then youve got some seriously crappy maintenance issues to sort out and the wrong propshaft fitted to the vehicle.

[gromit]

Theoretically, transmission brake linings should hardly wear at all.But series Landy ones wear out. Why? Well, the front spring shackles are behind the axle, so when the front wheels ride over bumps the front axle moves back slightly on the shackles In 4wd the front propshaft slip joint binds so that the rearward movement of the front axle is transmitted to the transfercase which also gets pushed back on its rubber mounts. However, the handbrake bellcrank that attaches to the pullrod on the expander is bolted to the chassis, so everytime the vehicle rides over bumps the handbrake is partially activated.A worn slip joint on the front propshaft can bind even in 2wd.
Later 2As and 3s have a rubber bushed rod between gearbox and chassis that reduces transmission movement, but it still moves enough to wear the linings if the linkage is over adjusted.
Bill.

Bill,

The slip joint on the rear propshaft is very badly worn (replacement propshaft needed) but I haven't checked the front yet.
Engine/gearbox mounts were all rooted, the gearbox mounts had been packed up with spacers because the mounts had compressed so much that the rear PTO shaft was touching the hole in the crossmember it runs through. Three of the four mounts had de-laminated.

Ex farmers car (prior to the last owner) so fixed rather than maintained.

Maybe the new mounts and a replacement propshaft will get rid of the problem but I also need to look at the operating mechanism to find out why it's loose on the backplate. Looking forward to spending the weekend underneath the S2 degreasing etc.



Colin

[wagoo]

If thats happening then youve got some seriously crappy maintenance issues to sort out and the wrong propshaft fitted to the vehicle.
No , just some seriously crappy vehicle design issues.
On the tediously long 'To Do' list to properly sort out a series LandRover, is a cable actuated handbrake or a transmission mounted handbrake lever, No other manufacturer in the world to my knowledge, including LandRover since the Stage Ones.and first RangeRovers uses a lever/bellcrank/rod linkage mounted independantly of the transmission.
Bill.

[wagoo]

Bill,

The slip joint on the rear propshaft is very badly worn (replacement propshaft needed) but I haven't checked the front yet.
Engine/gearbox mounts were all rooted, the gearbox mounts had been packed up with spacers because the mounts had compressed so much that the rear PTO shaft was touching the hole in the crossmember it runs through. Three of the four mounts had de-laminated.

Ex farmers car (prior to the last owner) so fixed rather than maintained.

Maybe the new mounts and a replacement propshaft will get rid of the problem but I also need to look at the operating mechanism to find out why it's loose on the backplate. Looking forward to spending the weekend underneath the S2 degreasing etc.



Colin
Colin, as John mentioned, the expander mechanism is designed to slide on the backing plate to balance the movement of the brake shoes.Don't quote me but from memory the nuts on the wedge type brake adjuster according to the manual is also intended to be tightened and then slackened off slightly before bending over the lock tabs.
Make sure your new front propshaft has a grease bleed hole in the end cap of the slip joint, otherwise suspension movement will push the transmission around too much.It's a bugger of a high maintenance design though. Once the front suspension is fully compressed, all the grease gets squeezed out the hole, and the remaining grease on the splines gets dispersed and the splines wear unless you regrease them regularly. Coil sprung propshafts dont have bleed holes because the slip joint telescopes instead of plunges with suspension movement.
Bill.

[wrinklearthur]

Colin, as John mentioned, the expander mechanism is designed to slide on the backing plate to balance the movement of the brake shoes.Don't quote me but from memory the nuts on the wedge type brake adjuster according to the manual is also intended to be tightened and then slackened off slightly before bending over the lock tabs.
A good point to remember, if I don't forget by the time I get to it. :confused:


Coil sprung propshafts dont have bleed holes because the slip joint telescopes instead of plunges with suspension movement.

That needs a little more thought, if the spline pulls and lengthens, then where does it go? It must return and compress the air inside that spline and what does this high pressure air blast do to the grease?
I might look at my prop shaft's again. ( the underneath of my bus needs a polish anyway ).
.

[wagoo]

A good point to remember, if I don't forget by the time I get to it. :confused:



That needs a little more thought, if the spline pulls and lengthens, then where does it go? It must return and compress the air inside that spline and what does this high pressure air blast do to the grease?
I might look at my prop shaft's again. ( the underneath of my bus needs a polish anyway ).
.
Coil sprung slips don't move much in comparison to leafers, and when they do telescope, the grease is in a sort of vacuum chamber and may get sucked back with the male spline. Being a vacuum ,there shouldn't be a high pressure blast of air when the joint plunges back.
Leaf sprung front slip joints, depending on how stiff the springs are, plunge so much that hitting a big bump shortly after being overgreased can result in the end cap popping out under hydraulic pressure, despite the bleed hole.
Veering off on a tangent.The hydraulic ram effect of LandRover slip joints is not as positive as on Toyota joints. Overgreasing leaf sprung Landcruiser slips will actually push the front axle forward from its normal position, so that when the suspension is working and the axle tries to move back, the hydraulic pressure tries to shear the transfercase in half. quite a few early transfercases failed for that reason back in the day.

bill.

[JDNSW]

No , just some seriously crappy vehicle design issues.
On the tediously long 'To Do' list to properly sort out a series LandRover is a cable actuated handbrake or a transmission mounted handbrake lever, No other manufacturer in the world to my knowledge including LandRover since the Stage Ones.and first RangeRovers uses a lever/bellcrank/rod linkage mounted independantly of the transmission.
Bill.

You are, I think, criticising design a bit anachronistically. At the time this system was designed, cable operation of any brakes was regarded as very suspect, as they invariably rusted solid in a very short time. I remember from my early days that it was rare for any car equipped with a cable operated handbrake to have it still working more than a month after the annual inspection. My sister ( seven years older than myself) is an example of someone who was trained by her mechanic husband to never use the handbake because it would stick on. And when I think of a Vauxhall a schoolfriend had with cable service brakes ......

I suspect they only became reliable when polymer coatings that worked were developed, about the mid sixties. With this background, a positive linkage was, in my view, a good design decision. Mounting the brake on the box may have made sense, but may have presented difficulties in catering for both left and right hand drive.

My experience in over fifty years of driving Series Landrovers, is that it is not a significant design fault.

John

[wagoo]

You are, I think, criticising design a bit anachronistically.

a positive linkage was, in my view, a good design decision. Mounting the brake on the box may have made sense, but may have presented difficulties in catering for both left and right hand drive.

My experience in over fifty years of driving Series Landrovers, is that it is not a significant design fault.

John
Can't see any issues with a standard S2 I have re fitting transmission mounted lever and linkage for either right or left hand drive.
Unfortunately series vehicles were chock full of relatively insignificant and some really significant design faults that when added together, produced a vehicle that was far below what it could have and should have been.
Bill.

[JDNSW]

Can't see any issues with a standard S2 I have re fitting transmission mounted lever and linkage for either right or left hand drive.
Unfortunately series vehicles were chock full of relatively insignificant and some really significant design faults that when added together, produced a vehicle that was far below what it could have and should have been.
Bill.

Again, I think you are using hindsight, not looking at the situation as it was at the time. While there are any number of bit that could have been designed better, there was, I would guess, always some very good reason why they were designed that way. Most often it was the result of the simple fact that Rover was only a very small company by the standards of any car company today, or most of their competitors in the period of Series production, and were always capital limited. Yet it was phenomenally successful for twenty years and quite successful for perhaps another ten. There was no successful competition until Leyland stultified progress by creaming off all the profits and not allowing significant design improvements or even increases in production capacity. Rover was unable to meet demand for twenty or more years until competition became successful enough to actually reduced demand.

To give a few examples that I know of - while power was increased substantially beyond the original design, it was not financially possible to design and tool up for new gearboxes and diffs to handle the additional power. The gearbox (I think a 1932 Rover design) was unable to be upgraded significantly until Series 3, and even then the need to retain the original dimensions to save other changes meant it was not entirely the hoped for result. Pretty much the same story for the diffs, also a prewar Rover design - changing these significantly would have meant a complete axle redesign, breaking compatibility with earlier models and complicating spare parts supply.

In all cases, using something already in production was much preferred to designing anew. The scarce capital available was used, for example, to produce the Range Rover, not to improve the Landrover that was already selling faster than they could build them.

You see a similar sort of story if you look at the history of Jeep, even though it was always a much larger company than Rover until the Leyland merger (of which, perhaps, the less said the better!) even when it was the original Willys. For example, Willys' IOE engine was actually a conversion of the side valve engine, not a completely new design as was Rover's a decade earlier. (Thus using most of the same tooling).

John

[fc110]

Again, I think you are using hindsight, not looking at the situation as it was at the time.

Also, customer resistance to change was very large thru into the 60's. Please don't measure reliability & "roadability" by today's standard. I am just old enough to remember what are now major roads being at times "4WD only". The 80's S1 & s2's did what they had to do at the time, & many, many country ppl remember them with great respect.

Back to "The original problem", how about worn or slack transfer case bearings, this results in the "top" shoe wearing more than the bottom one.

[wagoo]

Back to "The original problem", how about worn or slack transfer case bearings, this results in the "top" shoe wearing more than the bottom one.

The handbrake is a leading and trailing shoe design, meaning the top shoe does most of the work, except when the brake is used to prevent the vehicle from rolling backwards.Greater wear on the leading shoe therefore is to be expected, particularly if overadjusted.
Bill

[gromit]

The operating mechanism (expander) 'floats' on the backplate held in place by the packing piece, locking plate & retaining clip. There is a lot of wear in the grooves that the packing piece etc. fit into and the mechansim has been twisting judging by the wear pattern I can see. Even the flat surface that bears against the backplate is worn down.

Took one off my Series 3 parts car and almost the same wear pattern to the expander.

Looks like the expander was loose on the backplate so it drops (due to gravity) letting one shoe constantly rub and wear the lining away.

I'll have to track down a better condition expander.....


Colin

[wrinklearthur]

The operating mechanism (expander) 'floats' on the backplate held in place by the packing piece, locking plate & retaining clip. There is a lot of wear in the grooves that the packing piece etc. fit into and the mechansim has been twisting judging by the wear pattern I can see. Even the flat surface that bears against the backplate is worn down.

Took one off my Series 3 parts car and almost the same wear pattern to the expander.

Looks like the expander was loose on the backplate so it drops (due to gravity) letting one shoe constantly rub and wear the lining away. Colin

Hi Colin

I just put back together a hand brake into a late 2A, what a mess that rover is / was in !!
I ordered and received from DLS, UK;

One pair of new hand brake shoes for 2A, then I found that the gearbox is from a series one, Oh Joy! back to my scrap bin and found the remains of a series 2 transfer and hand brake, phew!!!

Couple of Oil seals for the output shaft, as I am now using the speedo drive housing from the scrap S2 stuff, used one of the oil seals, it did its job, but would have fit the series 1 anyway.

Hand brake expander, is still in its box, as I was able to tidy up the expander, used it with its backing plate from the scrap bin parts, the expander was seized and took a while to free all the bits up. Doing this I changed around the internal parts, so that the reversed housing gave the expander another go at life.

The wear in the series 1, speedo drive housing was enough to warrant changing to the 2A part, that required setting up the shims again between the back of the transfer box and the speedo housing.
Still a little bit tight after fitting another 10 thou of shims in, but I hope it will do.

All the threads on the studs and bolts of that part of the job, were given the wire wheel treatment and lots of spray from pressure pack cans to clean and lubricate the nuts so they run nicely on the threads, ( more time grrr ).

That 2A has; a series three front clip forward of the 2A 6 cylinder firewall, seat box from a S2 SWB, S1 gearbox and transfer ( high low lever is too close to the transmission tunnel and the floor has been hacked to make it fit ), truck cab and back is from a military land rover ( white roof and window panel, army green ), cab rear bottom panel was painted red (original colour).
Now this Land Rover has a 2A hand brake, the tray was off a old Toyota FJ45 and the rear diff is a Salisbury with its propshaft from a S3. Oh yeah the front hubs are S2 and the back ones are of course are S3 !!! why does that matter you may ask? try changing the wheels around, you will soon realise while the wheels fit, the wheel socket doesn't. :censored:

Sorry I went on a bit in this posting, but it was a pleasure to mow the lawns after that work yesterday. :(

[gromit]

Fitted it back together today.

I got hold of an as-new expander body and re-assembled it with my internals. When fitting it to the backplate I had to change the 'packer' for a thicker one and made sure there was some friction between the expander and the backplate to make sure it doesn't drop. I think even the boot helps add some resistance to movement if it rubs on the backplate.

Got it back together and spotted the main cause of the problem.....the return spring tab had been fitted to the wrong operating arm (the one from the expander) so it was permanently pulling the expander downwards. Moved this to the bottom of the arm from the handbrake lever, re-fitted the spring and after adjusting everything is OK. No drag and operates after 'three clicks'.
I spotted a 'home made' handbrake return spring on the handbrake lever so someone in the past must have realised there was a problem and added another spring. Problem is the downward pull on the expander left the trailing shoe always in contact with the drum.

Arthur, how much are handbrake shoes from the UK ? I'm paying $18 new and $15 for re-lined for the Series 2/3 type from a Clutch & Brake place near where I work....

I'll have to find someone who can aluminium weld the old expander body. It could be built up, filed back to the correct slot width and kept as a spare.


Colin

[wrinklearthur]

how much are handbrake shoes from the UK ? I'm paying $18 new and $15 for re-lined for the Series 2/3 type from a Clutch & Brake place near where I work....

Hi Colin

Check this receipt out.

Description: LAND ROVER SERIES 2/3 TRANSMISSION HAND BRAKE SHOE SET
Qty: 1
Unit Price: 9.14 GBP
Total: 9.14 GBP

Description: LAND ROVER SERIES 2/2A/3 HANDBRAKE EXPANDER UNIT
Qty: 1
Unit Price: 13.50 GBP
Total: 13.50 GBP

Description: LAND ROVER SERIES 2/3 HANDBRAKE - REAR OUTPUT OIL SEAL
Qty: 2
Unit Price: 2.55 GBP
Total: 5.10 GBP

Subtotal: 27.74 GBP
Shipping and handling: 9.95 GBP

Total: 37.69 GBP
Payment: 37.69 GBP

Payment sent to: SALES*******UK
From amount: $59.40 AUD
To amount: £37.69 GBP
Exchange rate: 1 Australian Dollar = 0.634511 British Pounds

I find with some prices that I get quotes over the phone for, I am still better off buying from overseas, as compared to running down into Hobart which takes time and fuel. Were as the overseas stuff usually takes about four days and is delivered to my door .
.

[gromit]

Arthur,

Probably not worth trying to get the handbrake expander built up with weld at those prices ......
Who was the supplier ?


Colin