Series 3 Brake back plates - Orientation

I am reassembling my rear axle on my 88" rebuild:

ENV differential, (not sure how relevant that is, but there you are).
11" single leading shoe brakes (a PO had these on the back, with 10" on the front! I am fitting Heystee discs up front and leaving the 11" on the back, with a pressure limiting valve)

I noticed when I dismantled the axle that the brake back plates are not exactly arranged vertically. See attached photo. The passenger side is very slightly rotated clockwise (ie the cylinder at the top is not quite at the 12 o'clock position, when viewed from the outside). The driver's side is the mirror image.

In the absence of any other detail, can anyone tell me if this is correct, or does it even matter? As far as I can tell, as long as the cylinder is somewhere near the 12 o'clock position it should all work OK. Are there any hard and fast rules? I've looked at both the plates and cannot distinguish if there is a left or right side. The layout of the six bolt holes also doesn't appear to let me put the plate on with the cylinder truly at the top. It will always be slightly offset, either clockwise or anti-clockwise, by a few degrees.

Any guidance will be much appreciated.
This is the passenger side, showing very slight rotation clockwise from 'vertical'.

Thanks
Andrew

I can't quite remember what mine look like but if the brakes have been working ok, I wouldn't worry about it.

Col

I've looked in the parts book and all the brakes are handed so if they are the same you have tow of the same side, may not be a showstopper. Tell us how you get on with the Heystee Discs, disc brakes are on my Christmas list....

The truck is a recent acquisition - been a farm vehicle for about twenty years before I got it. Abused to hell - everything worn. The brakes were terrible!

Consequently I'm pretty keen on getting them right when they go back together!

Cheers
Andrew

Well set up drum brakes are surprisingly good.

Col

The brake backplates are handed. I had a 109 that pulled badly to the left, turned out the PO had fitted two left hand backplates on the front ! Snail cam needs to be towards the front as in your pic.

Is it ex-mil? That front axle is a mil one. Speaking from expreince the "squaddy repairs" can be very variable, its perfecly possible they randomly fitted brake back plates. My rear axle apprears to have shed a crown wheel at some stage and then had the rear cover beaten back into shape and brazed, looking at size of the brass "drips" I would say it was a "field repair"!

Odd to see ENV axles on an 88. May have come from something like a 2b forward control.

It looks like one ENV, one Rover

I have no experience with ENV axles, but I expect that once the bleed nipple is at the top it will bleed okay.

Every drum brake I've seen has the shoes centred at 3 and 9 o'clock, ago I wonder why. OCD engineers? Or real science reason? Don't know.

Hi guys - thanks for replies. Sorry I have been away and didn't see them.
I was wondering about the front axle and its history, as it didn't look the same as others I have seen. The car is not ex military AFAIK, but it could have acquired a mil axle at some stage.
In the end I mounted the rear back plates with the cylinders just rotated forward of 12 o'clock towards the front of the car. This seemed to line up with various diagrams I had.
The ENV rear is in good order. Massive, heavy half shafts and the diff is very good, which is a bonus as parts availability appears to be zero. I assembled the rear axle onto new parabolics at the weekend. All was going very well until I discovered the U bolts supplied are slightly smaller than the axle case - I guess the ENV axle must have a larger diameter than standard. Anyway - managed to pull them around with some heavy levering. Now I am paranoid about the propshaft angles with the parabolics fitted. It seems raised a lot higher than the inch or so in the book, but there's currently no weight on the chassis at all.
Cheers
Andrew

ENV axles were mostly fitted to civilian 2b forward control models [ not the same as military 101 forward control ] They were fitted after it was found that standard rover axles were not up to the job on the 2a forward control model. They are a bit of a brute and should go on for years on your landy.
Springs will settle some with use and as long as the props turn freely with out the knuckles touching all should be good.
In the time of series models Land Rover often experimented with different fixtures and fittings on different models and when done with the development work those vehicles were just sold on in the normal way.
There is a 2a here in the UK that has independent front suspension!
So it could easily be yours had those ENV axles from new.
It could also be that yours was a special order vehicle by something like a utility company that needed something tougher than standard.
Cheers John.