Should brake shoe be this loose

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neilcmusic

Active Member
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383
Was looking at brakes because I think cylinder is leaking , poss hub seal (how do you tell which ? ) took hub off (easy) however noticed that one shoe is this loose , is this normal ,

Thanks
 

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is that passenger side?

you can pull the shoes back but it should take a bit of effort, if it lifts back with no effort then something is wrong, is the black spring on at the bottom? it should be across both shoes
 
this was the leaking cylinder on my s1, the fluid gets on the shoes and the linings disintegrate, another tell tale sign is the paint on the back of the wheel blistering up, that and no brakes :D
 

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Yeah my cylinder was as bad as that when I removed wheel , however shoes are in great condition just dirty , I cleaned it up for photo so ill replace that , how can I be sure its not the hub seal though? , its the passenger side rear , will have another look at spring on the bottom , however no spring on top and really easy to push out with one finger ? could the fact that shoe doesn't return to position explain leak or am I trying to kill 2 birds with 1 stone?
 
never done a hub, top spring only attaches to leading shoe on this type , top spring is usually red, bottom spring is black and holds both shoes together, you should also have a tennis racket shaped locking plate on the bottom of the shoe on the right of your pic that goes over the round thing the lower end of the shoes rest on.
 
dip your finger in the leaking substance and smell it Axle oil smells like cats pee . Sniff a bottle to see what I mean.
Is the bottom brake spring in the correct hole?
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I'll check if spring is it correct hole , I've just picked up a wheel cylinder , when I opened packet rubbers were loose and whole lot catapulted out of one end , I put it all back together again but it got me thinking , could I open up existing cylinder and put new working components in the shell whilst its still attached to the hub ? It would save me ages , this just seems to consist of a spring , a black "plug", metal piston and rubber seal , there must be a reason for not doing this because surely everybody would.
 
I'll check if spring is it correct hole , I've just picked up a wheel cylinder , when I opened packet rubbers were loose and whole lot catapulted out of one end , I put it all back together again but it got me thinking , could I open up existing cylinder and put new working components in the shell whilst its still attached to the hub ? It would save me ages , this just seems to consist of a spring , a black "plug", metal piston and rubber seal , there must be a reason for not doing this because surely everybody would.


people do do it.

you can get kits to replace all the rubber bits in a cylinder, a lot cheaper than a new cylinder, how effective they will be depends on how smooth the cylinder inner surface is, if it is badly pitted due to corrosion you would be better off buying a new cylinder.

I dropped a new one once and it fell apart, sadly it landed on one of the seals and put a nick in it so it was useless to use there and then, still have it and bought a seal kit, going to use them if another rear fails. apparently putting red rubber grease on the surfaces helps when using seal kits.
 
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The whole cylinder I purchased only cost £10 , would I still need to bleed it if this was the way I decided to go ?
 
seems cheap for a cylinder, but you would need to do a bleed, air may get in the system when you unhook the old one and there will be some air in the new cylinder.
 
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