Wheels lock up a few feet after shifting from P to D

Update. Took the drums off. Didn't find the smoking gun I was hopping for. I'd hopped to find a pebble or broken spring but just found a lot of crud. I wonder if this level of crud is typical for my milage or atypical and could be the cause of my problem. Both looked like this when I took the drums off:

After a few cans of brake cleaner this is where I am now:


I also bent the tab for the cable while I was at it.

Is there anything else I should do / remove / clean before I reassemble?

 

Yes, clean that stuff more often

your whole undercarriage is more dirt than paint/ finishes. Leaving it that dirty will let the dirt find new places to get to.

 

Start with checking rear brakes. If you don't find it, pull the 3rd member and inspect. I'm leaning towards a broken gear tooth loose in your rear axle. Every now and then it floats between the ring and pinion gears causing them to lockup. Reversing moved the tooth out of the way again.

Hopefully I'm wrong. Brakes are quicker and cheaper to fix.

 

I clean after every wheeling trip. The dirt you see is just from some deer scouting I did two days ago.

Hopefully I'm wrong. Brakes are quicker and cheaper to fix.[/QUOTE]
Oof. Shit, that sounds awful. I'd gladly learn all about drum brakes if it means not having to mess with the 3rd member.

 

That's a lot of crud in there. Lube the backing plates while you're in there.

 

I need to take the shoes off to do that right?

 

That is quite a bit of crud and it doesn't take much to jam between the shoe and the drum to lock up at slow speeds. That one leading shoe has a a small chunk taken out of the top of the lining...that could have been caused by debris cramming in there.

The broken gear tooth is also plausible. I'd start by draining the diff into a clean pan and inspecting the end of the drain plug and the oil for metal debris. Its normal to have some small amount of metal 'glitter' in the oil but much ore than that generally means some damage.

If the diff is hosed its hosed so I would probably clean and lubricate the rear brakes, slap it together and drive it a bit to see if the problem returns. If it does, yank the diff and pray to the deity of your choice for a low impact damage scenario.

 

sounds like its time to take the rear drums apart and have a look

 

Usually you can pull the retainer clip/spring that holds the shoe to the backing plate and pull the shoe out a bit to get some grease behind it. Don't pull it out too far and only do one shoe at a time.

That said, yes, remove it all, clean with brake cleaner, grease the backing plate contact points & adjuster and reinstall the parts isthe best way. Only disassemble one side at a time so you have a reference of where everything goes. Mindful of the leading vs trailing shoes.

 

Yeah I’ll button everything up tomorrow and keep my fingers crossed. If the problem continues I imagine it’s got to be related to the rear gears and I’ll pull the cover and inspect.

 

I checked my rears at 80k, and there was barely any wear on them. I drive a lot of highway miles though

 

No cover... Toyotas have 3rd members. You get to lift that heavy beast out of the axle housing as one big ol unit

 

Problem hasn’t come back yet so far. If it does I’ll update here again. I’m cautiously optimistic that cleaning out the gunk from the drums was the answer. I also cleaned off and checked the front calipers. Found a retaining clip out of sorts and a ton of mud, but I don’t think this was the cause of the initial issue.

 

Holy Hell I HATE mud... reason number 2 right here....

 

Ditto, mud sucks. High maintenance, little satisfaction

 

Cracks me up the level of post-nut clarity you get immediately after "sending it" through a mud patch lol

 

So after over 11 months the issue has returned.

First time I moved the truck in the driveway, started it up, drove to the other side of the driveway where it sat for an hour before starting again. Same thing, truck moved forward a few feet then came to an abrupt stop.

Second time was more concerning since I was under power, albeit slow and off road. I went though a (clean - no mud) water crossing ~18" deep, then 10 minutes later going up a slight incline, I felt like my IFS skid hit a huge rock. I thought maybe I stopped paying attention so I backed up to see what I hit, only to see nothing and realize the wheels had locked again.

With a new baby at home I decided to try and let the dealer diagnose the issue. The tech pulled the drums, found nothing glaringly wrong, and also did not see the same level of crud that I found last year when I was in there. Of course they could not duplicate the problem either. They want me to go back next week after they call Toyota. They're thinking maybe the parking brake cable? The sheathing on my cable looks to have pulled out. Maybe this is contributing to the problem? It's odd because it isn't the typical parking brake "freeze" because the truck moves a few feet after shifting to D. I'm concerned about it happening on the highway. @EatSleepTacos can I get your insight on this?

 

Only thing I can think of is to ditch the bracket that holds the e brake to the leaf pack. Mines been gone for years. Maybe that’s making it too tight, causing that sleeve to separate and therefore your issues? Could just get a new parking brake cable. I’d have to look up the p/n in front of a computer once my son goes to bed.

 

Yeah the cable sounds plausible. Only confusing part is that it happens after the truck is already underway: start truck, release parking bake, shift to D, drive forward a few feet, and then it locks up. If the cable was sticking it would make more sense that it wouldn’t want to release from the onset.

 

I agree that it’s odd. It’s the only thing I can think of though. Something parking brake related. The other option is to get new shoes, springs and adjusters in there. Just throw parts at it basically.