Please Help with rear brake adjustment

I've done it as soon as 10,000 miles. All depends on how the pedal feels to me when I drive it in. People don't realize the change because they drive it everyday and the change is very minimal.
When they drive off they just about put themselves through the windshield. Lol. I bought my truck on a Wednesday and a week later on a
Sat I had the truck half apart making upgrades, adjusting the brakes, pulling caliper pins and lubing,road force balancing tires, rear springs, alignment. I adjust my brakes every 6 months or 5000 miles at the latest. Anytime I pick up the truck I check and adj. if needed. If you think your pedal works at a lower point then it's time...

 

Yeah...I think it's time after reading your experience above. I made an appointment for adjustment Monday at the dealer.

 

Your mileage may vary, but the rear drums have automatic adjusters on them. That is what that little star wheel and lever are for. My personal experience is that I have only had to adjust the drum brakes after a brake shoe replacement, the automatic adjusters work fine. I pump the brakes when I back up and always use the Parking Brake.

Some may have a different experience.

 

What happened to the old school method of backing up and slamming on the brakes?

 

I don't think that was ever recommended as a way to adjust the brakes...

Just pumping them should do the trick along with using the parking brake.

 

What the manual doesnt show is that there this little tang that makes it hard to rotate. It helps to have another tiny screw driver to hold it back while rotating. The manual says 15 clicks, but for me it took 25 clicks to not feel any drag. I just hope before you take it to the dealer that the wheel moves freely....

 

This will be my last post on this subject.
The star wheel auto adjust does a lousy job adjusting.
25 clicks loose is so far out of adj. that brake bias is effected and accelerated front brake wear occurs.
Low brake pedal and out of adj e-brake is a result also.

Just remember anything you do to a brake system affects the stopping distance and reaction time of the system. If you don't know what your doing, which I see all the time here and in my bay, don't touch them. Peoples lives are at risk.

 

so you just adjust to 15 clicks and not double check it?

 

There should be some drag.

 

This thread may have died, but here I go... I replaced my shoes recently and I adjusted them like I always have, a little bit of drag, but equivalent on both sides.

My rear passenger side keeps tightening (by itself) to the point where it locks the wheel up. I have checked the brake cylinders and they seem to be free. I have also checked all my springs and hardware to ensure I installed everything correctly. Is it possible that there is an issue with my proportioning valve? I have never had to mess with one of these before, and I really do not see any way one of these could fail.

This is only happening on one wheel. Any ideas?

My brake fluid is 13 years old and has 210K miles on it and probably needs to be changed, but I really don't see how this could cause my issue.

 

If assembled properly there is no way that the adjuster can tighten up the brakes more than normal. And certainly not to the point of locking up that wheel.

Since your brake fluid is 13 years old and has 210 K miles on it I would suspect that the Brake Slave Cylinder is locking up due to moisture caused corrosion in the cylinder.

Recommend you rebuild / replace the wheel cylinders in the rear ( both sides ).
A good flush of the brake system and fluid replacement.

 

This video is helpful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWmAbDBJYP0

 

I'm doing the rear parking brake cable right now...SO that video and this guy....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ru8E9iw7nM

The hardest part is getting the drum off...

 

See the video in this post: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...ke-adjustment-mechanism.809918/#post-29048835

The system is self adjusting, but you can probably manually adjust to increase rear brake power if needed.