Replaced drums, shoes. Soft pedal...

[tmontague]

I would adjust the brakes as needed and then bleed. Prepare to have a seized bleed nipple and either try heat or just buy a newbrake cylinder.

You likely have air in the system when the spring blew out. A similar thing happened to me when I tore the boot and put in a new cylinder. A bleed fixed all of that for me

[06YarisRS]

Originally Posted by tmontague

I would adjust the brakes as needed and then bleed. Prepare to have a seized bleed nipple and either try heat or just buy a newbrake cylinder.

You likely have air in the system when the spring blew out. A similar thing happened to me when I tore the boot and put in a new cylinder. A bleed fixed all of that for me

Excellent! Thanks. I will follow your advice. I was going to buy wheel cylinders with my brake parts order but cancelled those as when I initially had the wheel off they looked good with no leaks. I'm kicking myself now, especially since they were like $8.00 CAD each and I would have saved on combined shipping. I guess I was hoping to avoid working with brake line fittings as well. Fingers are crossed that the rust protection spray I coated the back of the backing plate has helped loosen up the bleeder screws. I'm going to do the brake adjustment/bleed today. I have lots of DOT 3 in my garage, so I'll attempt a complete flush. I'll post back with good news...or bad.

[06YarisRS]

OK, posting back with bad news... I broke a bleeded screw off. I went quite gently, back and forth a bit just tapping my ratchet. I did not apply heat as I have no propane atm. If felt like it was letting go, then it sheered right off. I figured, here comes the brake fluid...Nope, not a drop. Examining the broken bleed screw in my hand, it was completely compacted with corrosion. It took some digging to get it out. Since I have no brake fluid leaking, I'm assuming what's left of the screw in the wheel cylinder is also plugged. I won't be driving the car until I replace the wheel cylinder. I'm not enthusiastic about removing the brake lines. Would heat be a good situation in this application? I'm going to do full bleed anyway, once I have the new wheel cylinders installed. And, I would definitely say I have air in the system. I have both rear wheels adjusted perfectly (I think) and still, a soft pedal.

On a more upbeat note, I did get the coolant changed and painted my calipers. So, all was not lost today.

[xdarkxfirex]

Be careful with wheel cylinders. There threads are really soft. Many aftermarket wheel cylinders are junk too. I've tried raybestos and had like 3 of them leak within a short period of time. Also dorman was crap too. I used centric premium off rockauto and it worked pretty good.

[06YarisRS]

Originally Posted by xdarkxfirex

Be careful with wheel cylinders. There threads are really soft. Many aftermarket wheel cylinders are junk too. I've tried raybestos and had like 3 of them leak within a short period of time. Also dorman was crap too. I used centric premium off rockauto and it worked pretty good.

Ah, great advice. Thanks. I was actually just at Rock Auto looking at the $6.99 Centric standard ones, but for an other buck and change, the Centric Premium sound like the way to go. Either way, I sure regret trying to save a few bucks on my brake parts order and removing the wheel cylinders from my cart. I think it was actually the Centric Premiums I had in my cart. Dang!