Warning: working on brakes? Don't do this!

[Yarflana]

Working on the rear brakes yesterday and while finishing up the reassembly on the passenger side rear, I put on the drum and decided to press the brake pedal a bit to ensure I had the e-brake and everything adjusted right.

Sounds fine right?

Well, I forgot that when reassembling the passenger side brakes that I had removed the drum from the driver's side which was still assembled just for a picture of what everything had to look like, but I DID NOT PUT THE DRUM BACK ON THE DRIVER'S SIDE WHEN PRESSING THE BRAKE PEDAL AND BLEW OUT THE CYNLINDER (SQUISH, SQUISH SQUISH).

So I of course had to replace the brake cylinder since the seals were blown out.

I am sure some of you could have rebuilt it there on the spot, but for $20 for a new one, it was worth it just to replace it.

Oh, also, here is a quick tip in case you ever do your own brakes on the drums again. Use some clamps with rubber grips to hold the shoes in place when reassembling...it makes doing it all SO MUCH EASIER! I had some 12" Sears Craftsman clamps with red rubber grips and they are the squeeze kind so you can micro adjust both ways.

I will tell you if I ever get rid of this Yaris...I will vow to never buy another car with any drum brakes again!

[bubbajones101]

most cars with rear disc brakes now come with shoes for the emergency brakes, so you can never get rid of them

[WeeYari]

^ but those will never, ever wear out. More accurate to state that you'll never have to deal with them.

Yeah, compared to working with calipers, drums are a real PITA.

[Geoff Peace]

Working on the rear brakes yesterday and while finishing up the reassembly on the passenger side rear, I put on the drum and decided to press the brake pedal a bit to ensure I had the e-brake and everything adjusted right.

Sounds fine right?

Well, I forgot that when reassembling the passenger side brakes that I had removed the drum from the driver's side which was still assembled just for a picture of what everything had to look like, but I DID NOT PUT THE DRUM BACK ON THE DRIVER'S SIDE WHEN PRESSING THE BRAKE PEDAL AND BLEW OUT THE CYNLINDER (SQUISH, SQUISH SQUISH).

So I of course had to replace the brake cylinder since the seals were blown out.

I am sure some of you could have rebuilt it there on the spot, but for $20 for a new one, it was worth it just to replace it.

Oh, also, here is a quick tip in case you ever do your own brakes on the drums again. Use some clamps with rubber grips to hold the shoes in place when reassembling...it makes doing it all SO MUCH EASIER! I had some 12" Sears Craftsman clamps with red rubber grips and they are the squeeze kind so you can micro adjust both ways.

I will tell you if I ever get rid of this Yaris...I will vow to never buy another car with any drum brakes again!

I would not dream of doing it! But, I also have made a few mistakes in my time, anyone who says they have never made a mistake is telling lies! The great trick is not to make the same mistake twice.
Regards Geoff Peace.

[RikBakke]

did the same thing years ago on a '72 beetle...

[Yarflana]

did the same thing years ago on a '72 beetle...

I had a '72 Beetle! What are the chances?

[BIGTAZ351]

Well Not to revive a 6+ year old dead thread...

WeeYari
""^ but those will never, ever wear out. More accurate to state that you'll never have to deal with them."" (Drum Parking Brakes) Not always true...

I have a new body style 2004 F150 with 4 wheel disc brakes and drum parking brakes...
I have had to remove the parking brake shoes completely because since the truck was new...(Had 7 miles on it when I brought it home) I had it fixed under warranty (last dealer's fix UNHOOK THEM!) every time I would use them they would not disengage all the way drag, overheat, and ruin the rear wheel seals causing rearend oil to leak all over. After the last time, and 140K miles...I gave up and removed ALL of that CRAP!

My Father in Law had similar issues with his GMC...Yet my Disc/Drum Chevy, no issues in fact, I never put rear brakes in it, in the 198,000 miles I drove it.

My Blue 2010 Yaris has 140K and rear drums haven't needed service yet...(Probably Soon) and every vehicle even my focus with 4 wheel discs rear pads were going bad (usually from road grime getting into them) just ad fast or faster than the front pads...

If I had my choice ALL of my vehicles would be Disc/Drum....heck I drove 30,000lb trucks with 4 wheel hydraulic drum brakes!

[suprf1y]

If I had my choice ALL of my vehicles would be Disc/Drum....heck I drove 30,000lb trucks with 4 wheel hydraulic drum brakes!

Me too. I see no advantage to rear disc on street driven cars. Drum brake are actually very good at what they do. The only downside is that they build up heat quickly and fade which is not an issue on the street.

You see a lot of people upgrading their drum brakes to disc on models where that's an option. I would NEVER do that.

[tmontague]

I agree that in crazy small/light cars like the Yaris and Micra drums are more than adequate. However I disagree that most passenger cars are fine with only rear discs.

My Outback has front and rear discs and compared to my Vibe and Yaris with rear drums, the brakes are much more responsive. I actually almost over shoot the first stop when I get in my Vibe from driving the Outback for a while. It is ridiculous how much pressure you need to apply compared to the OB.

Both have ceramic DDer pads on them. This issue is less pronounced in my Yaris due to its light weight at being just over 2000lbs whereas my Vibe is around 2800lbs. Now the rear drums in the Vibe need to be adjusted a bit more snug as they are a bit too loose, but this is another issue that drums have that rear discs don't. They almost never self adjust properly and you constantly have to adjust them.

I prefer discs as they are easier to service IMO and have a much better engagement feel to them. I have also tested this in other cars like my parents 2006 Chrysler Sebring which has 4 disc brakes.

[myfirstyota]

Seeing as how I swapped to 2012 rear disks on my car, I'm gonna have to say I like rear disks hahah. Car stops amazing and flat. Very little nose dive in hard braking and havent had any lock up issues as of yet.

[suprf1y]

Drum brakes are actually better at stopping than disc brakes because they have more surface area for a given package size, but like i said, they fade in extreme conditions. Your comparison is not valid as you're comparing completely different cars. My Wife's Sonic stops many times better than my Swift GT which is 1000 lbs lighter, therefore drum brakes are superior :)

Easier to service? In all te years I've been a professional mechanic I can count on both hands how many rear drum brake jobs I've had to do. They last MUCH longer. Never having to do a job is much easier than actually doing it no matter how simple it is.

[NYC-SE]

The reason rear drums last longer is because the don't work as well. In rear drum cars it is the front discs that are doing the real work. With rear discs they can be biased to share more of the braking load. I believe VW even rear biases their cars (or at least used to).

Rear discs for me. FTW.

[suprf1y]

In any application the front does 60-70 percent of the braking. I used to be under the same mistaken impression until one of the guys I raced with set me straight. He was a brake engineer for one of the big three

[B.B._07]

Me too. I see no advantage to rear disc on street driven cars. Drum brake are actually very good at what they do. The only downside is that they build up heat quickly and fade which is not an issue on the street.

You see a lot of people upgrading their drum brakes to disc on models where that's an option. I would NEVER do that.

I agree that rear drums are superior from a durability and reliability point of view, but they loose out to discs in stopping power. It's not really an issue on a light car like a Yaris or even a Civic but anything bigger and you really need discs in the back to keep the stopping distances down. That's why you don't see rear drums on larger cars or SUV's.

[suprf1y]

Like I said in the previous post, I used to think the same thing, and I was wrong too

[Mike Dexter]

I DID NOT PUT THE DRUM BACK ON THE DRIVER'S SIDE WHEN PRESSING THE BRAKE PEDAL AND BLEW OUT THE CYNLINDER (SQUISH, SQUISH SQUISH).

LOL, I made that mistake once as well.

[myfirstyota]

Drums have all kinds of stopping power. Check out a transport truck. Most all of them have drums all the way around. They just don't handle heat very well. No venting. That's why truck brake fires aren't unheard of.

[ex-x-fire]

To me, all the rear disc brakes on everything nowadays is hype. I my neck of the woods most are nonworking because of rust jacking between the pads and the brackets.

[400 dollar yaris]

Working on the rear brakes yesterday and while finishing up the reassembly on the passenger side rear, I put on the drum and decided to press the brake pedal a bit to ensure I had the e-brake and everything adjusted right.

Sounds fine right?

Well, I forgot that when reassembling the passenger side brakes that I had removed the drum from the driver's side which was still assembled just for a picture of what everything had to look like, but I DID NOT PUT THE DRUM BACK ON THE DRIVER'S SIDE WHEN PRESSING THE BRAKE PEDAL AND BLEW OUT THE CYNLINDER (SQUISH, SQUISH SQUISH).

So I of course had to replace the brake cylinder since the seals were blown out.

I am sure some of you could have rebuilt it there on the spot, but for $20 for a new one, it was worth it just to replace it.

Oh, also, here is a quick tip in case you ever do your own brakes on the drums again. Use some clamps with rubber grips to hold the shoes in place when reassembling...it makes doing it all SO MUCH EASIER! I had some 12" Sears Craftsman clamps with red rubber grips and they are the squeeze kind so you can micro adjust both ways.

I will tell you if I ever get rid of this Yaris...I will vow to never buy another car with any drum brakes again!



Agreed.... when doing my rear brakes about two months ago, I split the rubber part of the driver side wheel cylinder while getting frustrated with positioning the shoes and tensioner. Had to take it to the dealer to replace the cylinder. Complete PITA. One side took me as long as both front rotors and pads + some. My next car purchase will also be a car with 4 wheel disk brakes. Only advice I can give on the rear brakes is take pictures of everything, Take your time, make sure the tensioner is back in the correct position, never depress the brake pedal with drum off. I love the yaris, but dont know if the new models still have drums. I would only consider if it has drums though. :iono: