K2500 Bake Shoes: Thicker Shoe Goes Where?

[Big T]

Replacing brake shoes and drums on the '99 Suburban. Old shoes had rivets and the ones with 3 rows of rivets are mounted to the rear. Got shoes from Napa and the brake material is bonded without rivets, but two shoes have thicker material. Do the thicker shoes go towards the rear?

 

[dbrannon79]

I wasn't aware the two shoes were different thickness. I always thought it was shorter vs longer.

 

[Big T]

I found the answer: thicker goes to the rear as it wears the most.

 

[3500GMC]

^^This does make sense, as mentioned above the longer, and now sometimes THICKER shoe is mounted to the rear both left and right sides. This is due to the self-energizing function of passenger car and light truck drum brakes.