Replace brake shoes, or maybe not

A few years ago, when ordering some parts from Rock Auto, I added to the basket a set of Bendex 589 brake shoes. I figured at the time with my truck north of 125,000 miles they will soon need replacing. https://www.rockauto.com/en/parts/bendix,589,brake+shoe,1688

They since have been storage. So now with, 167,000 miles on the truck, I figured maybe I should change them out. I removed the drums and find lots of brake dust inside but the shoes look surprisingly good. I remove the driver's side rear shoe and try to match it up with one of the Bendex units.

Oh boy, the new shoes don't have the pin for the little lever to slide on. Well there goes my afternoon. The new shoes measure .350" at the shoe thickness and the old shoes measure .310 with what seems like ample material remaining.

So, what do I have here? I'm thinking I'm going to just reassemble and let her keep going (or keep stopping might be a better choice of words). But whatsup with this missing pin? Has anyone else seen this?

 

what pin are you talking about?

also, 174k here on original shoes. unless you haul or tow often the rear sees about 25% of the braking at best, unless you adjust them tighter

 

Yeah, they last forever...

I cleaned mine out and changed them anyway. They were 14 years old and had lots of material. I already had new ones, and I was replacing leaky cylinders. So I did it all.

 

Over 320k miles and 25 years on the original shoes showing less than 50% wear. I dusted them out and put drums back. Rear brakes pass annual safety inspections (including breaking power) with flying colors every year.

 

I'm about to do mine this weekend at 152k miles. Everything is super rusty so I'm gonna replace drums, pads, wheel cylinders, and all the hardware. Fingers crossed I don't need new backing plates, they're looking pretty bad though.

 

The pin that supports the lever that rides on the adjustment wheel to allow auto adjustment of the brakes. I'm sure it isn't something I can just leave off.

I'm just going to reassemble with the original shoes. I'll probably donate the new brake shoes to the local ReStore store or something.

At about 90,000 miles I did the Tundra front disc brake conversion which improved the braking. If you've not done this upgrade you need to. These Tundra brakes are probably over compensating for the rear and minimizing their wear.

 

Yep both of my older ones same thing.The old 87 was long in the tooth at 300+K the drums were not comming off without replacing the drums so I sold it but I'll bet they were still good.

 

can that pin be taken out and moved? I honestly don't remember having that but I'm sure it's there

also I just recently did the TBU so I have over 170k on the OEM rear shoes. they just don't get worn very much

 

that pin is knocked out and transferred but I would keep running those shoes as if it isnt broke, dont fix it.

 

The pin comes out you need to reuse it. It should come out fairly easily don't just pound on it if it's really tight you can damage the grove the retainer fits in. Me I would put them back on, put anti seize on the axle hub put the drum back on and call it good.

 

There's no hole in the new shoe to transfer the pin to. And the pin seems to be peened into place, but considering there's no hole available in the new shoe I didn't put much effort into removing it.

I used a paint brush to dislodge the brake dust while I vacuumed the results. Inside my shop I didn't want the mess of brake cleaning fluid or the dust of compressed air so that's where the backing plate and shoe cleaning stopped. It's now much cleaner than it was.

The drums were taken outside where I brushed and then compressed-air blew them clean.​

They came apart easily using the jack screw method so I didn't apply any anti-seize when reassembling. I'm now confident the rear brakes will last as long as I keep this truck.

Thanks for your help!

 

dumb question, but have you looked at the other shoes in the box? i'd wager they don't all look the same

 

Not a dumb question, this morning I checked and saw all the shoes are the same. I wanted to be sure before I posted the earlier message. Perhaps whoever packed the box didn't include two of the correct shoes.

 

All the other brands of shoes for your truck on Rock Auto have the pin: https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog...+v6,1418453,brake+&+wheel+hub,brake+shoe,1688

So chalk it up to incorrect manufacturing of an aftermarket part. I'd keep going with the old shoes unless the friction material is glazed or showing spider cracks.

 

you should not have all that brake dust in there?
clean or get them cleaned out every year or every other year tops, depending on mileage is good rule of thumb,no?
is most important in the winter climates so them drums won't freeze on ya if needed removed at some point

 

@TACO in SC welcome to the wonderful world of mid year changes and companies not listing correctly. You have the wrong brake shoes

Bendix 764 is what you want. From now on I would look at the pics or use 2004 as 95% is the same. The Centric shoes have the pin but those Bendix are probably from the 96-02 with the E-brake on the top, which would move the auto-adjuster lower?

 

In the future I will again remove each drum, in an outside setting, and blow everything out. As easy as it disassembled that shouldn't take very long. It seems true I do have the wrong brake shoes. The Bendix 764 say for '03 - '04 model while the 589 says '95 - '03. So my truck must be in a late '03 model year.

 

glad you got it sorted. that would be so annoying trying to order parts.

 

more like mid-'03. this is when they changed to ECTS TB and also the "under axle" e-brake setup. not sure why they did it but we learn from being on here, at least I have

 

They all are trailing shoes you should have 2 with less lining. They will not work properly on any year truck.