Had a rough time removing a drum.

I had a rough time removing one of my drums because the brake pad was stuck. The brake shoe retainers broke (I have new ones anyways but the little things in my hand fell out and they go where shoe hits the hydraulic cylinder. They fell out too. The rubber boot on the hydraulic cylinder that surrounds these two pieces has a little tear in it and the pieces in my had have a tiny "angle" to them almost as if they were bent. The other side has the same angle though as well and it came off no problem.

Do I need to install new hydraulic cylinders or are mine fine?

 

I feel your pain. I did exactly the same thing.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but unfortunately, both wheel cylinders are now ruined. The cylinder with the torn boot will leak as brake dust grit will get in there and ruin the piston seal.

As for the metal tangs you are holding, they are made of aluminum and hold the top of the brake shoes in proper position against the cylinders. If you try to bend them back into position they will break right off.

NAPA has (had) some decent after market wheel cylinders that were substantially less expensive than getting gouged by the stealer. Be careful, it is easy to tear those boots again repositioning the shoes back on.

Here is a tip for next time. On high mileage vehicles the rear shoes will often form a grove (valley) in the drum and tend to hold the shoes in that grove. If you feel questionable resistance at all trying to remove a rear drum don't even try to force them off or use the technique of threading M8 X 1.25 bolts in the two holes present to pull the drum off IMHO. The hold down springs on the shoes are just too weak, will give away, and the aluminum tangs on the cylinders will bend or break as you found out. Get in the cab, find the ebrake cable adjustment point, and loosen the shoes away from the drums.

If worse comes to worse, if you have moved the drum out just a little, loosen the bleeder screws and try to compress the shoes with screwdrivers, then tighten the bleeder screws. Obviously bleeding the brakes is in your future. Good luck.

 

next time retract the shoes with a brake spoon before you go yanking the drum off. the self adjusters adjust the shoe to drum clearance and they get caught in the groove made by wear and time

 

This is the the proper way. It has always been like this for brake shoes... or at least as long as I can remember...

 

this is also very helpful. alternate screws until drum comes off

 

Skis - looks like there was a suggestion this should not be performed if there is any questionable resistance. People should be careful because I've used this method when there was resistance but was lucky enough to only replace some springs and parts which fixed my mistake.

 

why does he need 2 cylinders?

they only work on new trucks from what I have found. rusted out threads = no worky

 

They work awesome for disc rotors usually!

 

He doesn't really? If I was the op I would replace both sides, right and left wheel cylinders while I was at it. Why not I don't know the history of the vehicle but I'm sure the other one would take a crap sooner than later.

Do one side as you do to the other replace in sets.

Thanks,

Brett

 

Another thing that is often not known or over looked is to take the parking brake off when removing the rear drums also don't press down the brake pedal while the drums are off. I'm not saying you did, but I know a few friends that learned the hard way.

Thanks,

Brett

 

In my experience, since brake fluid attracts moisture, and most people don't flush their brake fluid regularly, there is usually a little bit of rust in the center of the wheel cylinder, between the two pistons. In one particular case, that rust spot was off center. I changed the shoes, and the new, thicker shoes pushed the pistons back into the cylinders and the rubber seals behind the pistons hit the rust spot on one side. Two days later, no brakes. Since then, always new wheel cylinders for me.

Never had an issue with disc brake calipers, just wheel cylinders on the drum brakes.

There are rebuild kits, my experience with those is that they usually will leak again down the road.

Edit: Been awhile, but I don't think those little spacers come with the wheel cylinders. Maybe as part of the "hardware kit"?