Thread: Replacing series 3 brake shoes - drum won't go back on!

not out in a boat on your own

it's official


between out of round drums and shoes that werent aligned properly when welded...

still trying to get them so they dont bind after being used a bit but getting better than they were :P

well and truly over the experience i can tell you...

When I fitted shoes on any of my Series Landies I always used to have them radius ground to match the drums. No trouble fitting then and the brakes worked really well.

I don't know if you can still have the radius grinding done but it may be worth while enquiring at some of your local brake specialists.

In the past, I seem to remember very carefully grinding a little bit off both steel ends of the shoe. I can't remember, but I think I checked how the curvature matched the drum, though really I wouldn't worry too much as they will eventually match anyway. The important thing is that they don't drag and of course that they work properly!

It also helps to chamfer the leading edges of the shoes. That stops a few different problems.

Originally Posted by pfillery

So have bought new brake shoes and slave cylinders for all wheels, might as well do the job once and properly. Some of my originals got soaked with brake fluid and I didn't want to take any chances. It is the wider shoed 6 cylinder brake setup for the LWB.

Anyway, all fitted according to correct method however the drum will not go back on, ie the shoes sit out too far. Yes I've checked the snails and they are all the way in, making no contact with the shoes, have also checked the stabilising bolts that go in the centre of the shoe and they are adjusted correctly. The shoes came from British offroad at Forest Glen so should be the same as original, although they look just a tad larger than my originals (the original originals that came with the car from new). I can get the drum about halfway on before it binds and won't go any further. I've tried the drum without pads and with the old pads and it fits fine. There is no ridge on my drum which has virtually no wear. Have tried them in all possible orientations on the wheel they fit and no joy.

Any ideas? something I've overlooked or maybe the wrong part? Or the joys of aftermarket parts? HELP!

I had the same dramas with the front brakes on my series three.
Mine were standard ten inch drums and I tried three sets of shoes and the best I got was a set that dragged like hell and would have cooked the drums. I didn't want to machine the drums as it wasn't warranted, so i used another over size pair that I had on a donour vehicle. They weren't out to the max, but about 1/32" oversize and that was enough to do the job.

Good luck!

Mine has the 11 inch drums so no room to go bigger. As the car is on original drums and shoes (only 60k kms on them from new), there is no wear or grooving to the drums so machining them is not an option for now, I'm going to take them back tomorrow and double check if they have sold me the right ones, options are to shave the shoes slightly which I should be able to do adequately at home or get a set elsewhere, or look at getting my set relined if anywhere still does that.

At a pinch my old set is ok but I'm just not that trusting after one side has been soaked in brake fluid and is starting to delaminate. Plus it would be good to get away from the asbestos linings (can see all the lovely fibres sticking out of the pad substrate).

Originally Posted by mick88

I had the same dramas with the front brakes on my series three.
Mine were standard ten inch drums and I tried three sets of shoes and the best I got was a set that dragged like hell and would have cooked the drums. I didn't want to machine the drums as it wasn't warranted, so i used another over size pair that I had on a donour vehicle. They weren't out to the max, but about 1/32" oversize and that was enough to do the job.

Good luck!

In the good old days you could get brake shoes "radius ground" to suit the drums, but being standard yours should fit the radius of the drum.
The other option is just get a rasp and take the high spots off the shoes.

There is a product that you can spray onto brake shoes or clutch plates that have been contaminated with oil.
I think it is called "brakeclean" and may be made by "CRC"


Cheers, Mick.

I took the shoes back this morning, the ones I got as a replacement were slightly thinner in the padding, apparently they manufacture a random selection of different thicknesses to allow for those who have needed to machine their drums, some are more oversized than others. Hopefully this should allow fitting without needing to file them. If needs be I'll file the shoes slightly (by fitting some sandpaper inside the drum with double sided tape and radius grinding them slightly). Worst case scenario is that I'll have the drums machined a bare minimum.

Originally Posted by mick88

In the good old days you could get brake shoes "radius ground" to suit the drums, but being standard yours should fit the radius of the drum.
The other option is just get a rasp and take the high spots off the shoes.

There is a product that you can spray onto brake shoes or clutch plates that have been contaminated with oil.
I think it is called "brakeclean" and may be made by "CRC"


Cheers, Mick.

I noticed in the manual that came with my series a hand scrawled annotation for '4mm brake shoes', so I guess it's fairly common for shoes not to fit.